UC-NRLF 


INING  FOR  A 

LIFE  INSURANCE 
AGENT 

WARREN  M.  HOKN'EP, 


LIPPINCOTT'S 

TRAINING  SERIES 

"FOR  THOSE  WHO  WANT 
TO  FIND  THEMSELVES" 


TRAINING  FOR  A  LIFE 
INSURANCE    AGENT 


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TRAINING  FOR  A  LIFE 
INSURANCE  AGENT 

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LIPPINCOTT'S  TRAINING  SERIES 

TRAINING  FOR  A  LIFE 
INSURANCE  AGENT 


BY 

WARREN  M.  HORNER 

LIFE  INSURANCE  AGENT  AND  MANAGER,  WRITER  AND  LECTURER 
ON  LIFE  INSURANCE  TOPICS 


'  Be  not  a  man  of  many  words  nor 
busy  about  too  many  things." 

— MAHCUS  AURELIUS. 


ILLUSTRATED 


PHILADELPHIA  &  LONDON 

J.  B.  LIPPINCOTT  COMPANY 


COPTRIOHT,    IQI7,   BY  J.   B.    LIPPINCOTT  COMPANY 


PUBLISHED     MARCH,   IQI7 


PRINTED    BT  J.    B.    LIPPINCOTT  COMPANY 

AT  THE  WASHINGTON  SQUARE  PRESS 

PHILADELPHIA,  U.  8.  A. 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DEDICATED  TO 
JOSEPH  ASHBROOK 

FROM  WHOM  I  HAVE  RECEIVED 
GREAT  INSPIRATION  AND  HELPFUL 
SUGGESTIONS  IN  MY  LIFE'S  WORK 


463305 


'How  blessed  is  he  who  crowns 

in  shades  like  these, 
A  youth  of  labor  with  an 
age  of  ease." 

— GOLDSMITH. 


'One  science  only  will  one  genius  fit, 
So  vast  is  art,  so  narrow  human  wit.' 
—POPE. 


INTRODUCTION 

A  PREFACE  to  a  book  should  be  like  any 
other  introduction,  a  sort  of  "  Who's  Who — 
Why's  Why— and  What's  What  "  proposi- 
tion. At  any  rate,  I  am  the  one  who  has 
been  selected  by  the  publishers  to  set  down 
some  facts  about  an  important  world  move- 
ment because  there  is  much  need  for  such 
a  work. 

The  Life  Insurance  business  is  conspicu- 
ous in  contrasts.  It  is  the  most  important 
thing  to  the  people,  and  they  know  the  least 
about  it.  It  is  the  most  scientific  business  in 
the  world,  with  very  unscientific  methods  in 
the  producing  end.  It  is  a  veritable  fairy- 
land for  the  imaginative  mind,  in  its  ramify- 
ing opportunities  for  constructive  service  and 
personal  development.  Yet  one  must  go 
through  the  darkest,  coldest  dungeon  of  de- 
spair and  privation  to  attain  mastery. 

It  has  the  most  enticing  allurements  for 
the  really  successful  on  the  gilded  side;  yet 
the  average  agent  is  a  financial  failure,  and 
a  greatly  preponderating  number  of  those 


INTRODUCTION 

who  undertake  the  work  never  attain  any 
reasonable  success,  but  stray  into  other 
pastures. 

There  are  good  reasons  for  these  appar- 
ently irreconcilable  divergent  conditions,  and 
I  hope  to  make  them  reasonably  clear  in  the 
chapters  of  this  book. 

I  believe  in  Life  Insurance  as  a  vocation, 
not  passively,  but  with  a  burning  intensity 
that  is  almost  an  obsession.  It  is  not,  how- 
ever, any  job  for  a  lightweight  or  a  shirk. 
Anyone  who  desires  to  enter  the  Life  Insur- 
ance business  should  study  the  situation  care- 
fully, and  make  the  fight  only  after  he  feels 
called  to  this  great  work  of  conservation. 

This  book  is  written,  primarily,  for  those 
directly  interested  in  the  Life  Insurance  busi- 
ness, but  in  a  non-technical  manner  so  that 
it  may  be  of  value  to  laymen,  especially 
those  interested  in  salesmanship. 

I  have  striven  earnestly  and  naturally  to 
add  something  of  value  where  there  is  great 
need  for  enlightenment  and  standardized  en- 
deavor, and  sincerely  hope  the  reader's  ver- 
dict will  be  that  it  is  not  written  in  vain. 
WARREN  M.  HORNER. 

January,  1917. 


CONTENTS 


PART  I 
TRAINING  FOR  A  LIFE  INSURANCE  AGENT 

PAGE 

OPPORTUNITY 15 

WHO  SHOULD  BEGIN — WHEN,  AND  How 24 

SALESMANSHIP 38 

SYSTEM  AND  EFFICIENCY 47 

THE  STANDARDIZED  REPRESENTATIVE 55 

GENERAL  AGENCY  OR  ORGANIZATION  METHODS 64 

SOME  SIDE-LIGHTS  ON  THE  LIFE  INSURANCE  BUSINESS  ...  75 

DOES  IT  PAY  TO  ADVERTISE  ? 86 

THE  WOMAN  IN  LIFE  INSURANCE 92 

RECAPITULATION 99 

PART  II 

THE  LIFE  INSURANCE  AGENT  AND  THE  LAYMAN 

THE  AGENT  AND  THE  LAYMAN 109 

BUSINESS  LIFE  INSURANCE Ill 

WELFARE  INSURANCE 117 

INCOME  INSURANCE 128 

LAYMEN'S  RESPONSIBILITY.  .  ....  ISO 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


PAGE 


A  MODEL  AGENCY  ORGANIZATION   (CHART)  ....  Frontispiece 

EFFICIENCY  DIAGRAM 33 

KEY  TO  SUCCESS 52 

EFFICIENCY  METHODS  (CHART) 58-59 

KEY  TO  OFFICE  FURNITURE.  .  .   66-67 


PART  I 

TRAINING  FOR  A  LIFE 
INSURANCE  AGENT 


TRAINING  FOR  A  LIFE 
INSURANCE    AGENT 

CHAPTER  I 

OPPORTUNITY 

As  an  institution  for  systematic  thrift,  as 
a  means  of  preventing  want  and  pauperism, 
as  a  medium  of  safeguarding  the  home  and 
old  age,  as  an  equalizing  force  in  business, 
and  as  a  leveller  of  human  affairs,  sound  Life 
Insurance  stands  as  a  great  bulwark  to  man- 
kind. 

It  is  quite  unusual  that  a  business  of  such 
ramifying  importance  in  its  economic  and 
beneficent  value  to  the  public  should  be  ac- 
corded so  much  prejudice  and  be  so  generally 
shunned  as  a  vocation.  This  bias  and  aloof- 
ness has  materially  lessened  in  recent  years, 
but  the  condition  is  still  far  from  satisfactory, 
although  without  any  fundamental  reason. 

Life  Insurance,  in  its  inception,  was  asso- 

15 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

elated  with  death  and  its  resultant  sorrows 
and  harrowing  experiences.  The  fact  that 
the  business,  in  its  beginning  or  undeveloped 
stages,  apparently  had  to  do  only  with  death 
and  its  grim  realities,  made  the  work  of  early 
proponents  of  the  system  fraught  with  stag- 
gering hardships.  The  crusading  methods 
required  to  break  down  prejudice  and  lack 
of  understanding,  to  get  people  to  do  the 
very  obvious  thing  of  insuring  their  lives, 
served  to  build  up  prejudice  against  the  busi- 
ness as  lacking  caste.  Indeed,  Life  Insur- 
ance agents,  as  a  rule,  have  been  regarded 
as  a  sort  of  necessary  evil,  and  even  by  many 
as  an  unnecessary  evil.  The  preposterous- 
ness  of  this  point  of  view  cannot  alter  the 
fact  of  its  existence.  Neither  does  the  con- 
dition militate  against  the  business  in  its  op- 
portunities, exactly  the  reverse  being  true. 

Before  amplifying  the  many  opportunities 
afforded  by  the  business  of  Life  Insurance, 
a  brief  survey  of  its  development  in  the 
United  States  should  be  given. 

The  founders  of  the  system  of  Legal  Re- 

16 


OPPORTUNITY 

serve  Life  Insurance  builded  better  than  they 
knew.  It  is  the  greatest  system  of  finance 
in  behalf  of  the  public  weal  ever  devised. 
In  this  country,  with  its  rapid  growth  and 
multiplication  of  fortunes  and  enterprises, 
with  incident  hazards,  Life  Insurance  has 
become  both  a  personal  and  business  neces- 
sity, and  is  viewed  generally,  and  very  prop- 
erly, in  the  light  of  a  conservation  measure. 

It  is  unfortunate  that  those  at  the  home 
offices  and  in  the  field  who  dealt  with  the 
public  in  the  early  stages  did  not  themselves 
have  a  clearer  idea  of  the  true  significance 
of  the  business,  and  dress  their  presentation 
of  the  subject  in  a  more  attractive  manner, 
from  a  human  and  economic  standpoint. 
Much  of  the  prejudice  and  aloofness  toward 
Life  Insurance  and  its  salesmen  would  never 
have  existed  had  a  broader  and  saner  presen- 
tation been  given  the  public  from  the  start, 
and  a  more  efficient  and  scientific  method 
of  appointing  and  training  agents  been 
practised. 

Again,  the  lack  of  a  drastic  uniform  state 

2  17 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

law,  or,  what  is  far  better,  a  federal  law, 
for  the  incorporation  and  control  of  com- 
panies, has  resulted  in  much  spuriousness 
and  exploitation  to  aggravate  anti-public 
opinion. 

With  all  these  handicaps,  the  business  has 
grown  in  value  enormously,  and  in  the  minds 
of  the  public,  in  a  better  understanding  and 
appreciation  of  its  benefits  to  them,  and  to 
such  an  extent  as  to  make  the  opportunity 
limited  only  by  the  capacity  and  energy  of 
the  agent. 

The  modern  interpretation  of  Life  Insur- 
ance is  not  just  Death  Assurance,  but  live 
insurance  for  live  people.  While  the  busi- 
ness is  built  around  the  uncertainty  of  life 
and  certainty  (uncertainty  of  time)  of  death, 
it  has  gradually  taken  on  a  more  human 
and  attractive  dress,  in  the  shape  of  income 
and  annuity  policies,  or  those  used  in  busi- 
ness as  fiscal  governors  in  an  enterprise,  and 
as  welfare  or  profit-sharing  media  for  em- 
ployees of  all  classes. 

The  business  does  hold  wonderful  oppor- 

18 


OPPORTUNITY 

tunity  for  the  agent  who  can,  and  will,  make 
the  fight  in  breaking  through  the  outer  crust 
of  antagonistic  public  mind  to  the  inner  state 
of  both  a  conscious  and  subconscious  attitude 
of  receptivity.  The  piercing  of  this  armor 
of  aloofness  is  a  man's  job,  and  only  those 
possessed  of  understanding  and  industry 
should  undertake  the  work. 

Fortunately,  the  co-operative  method  of 
compensation  based  upon  results,  and  elim- 
ination of  the  salary  evil,  offer  inducements 
in  that  the  merit  system  prevails  entirely 
as  to  financial  reward.  This  feature  is  made 
the  more  attractive  because  the  agent  is  paid 
not  only  a  commission  on  the  first,  but  also 
on  subsequent  premiums.  These  renewal  or 
collection  payments  are,  under  certain  con- 
ditions, paid  even  after  the  agent  leaves  the 
service,  owing  to  death,  incapacity  or  resig- 
nation. This  building  of  an  income  as  a 
future  reward  is  both  just  and  sound  busi- 
ness procedure. 

From  the  compensatory  angle,  there  are 
three  very  important  and  attractive  advan- 

19 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

tages  in  Life  Insurance  as  a  vocation:  (a) 
The  unlimited  absorbing  power  of  the  pub- 
lic; (b)  the  co-operative  nature  of  reward, 
eliminating  salary  evils;  and,  (c)  The  pay- 
ments over  a  term  of  years  resulting  in  a 
non-forfeitable  estate  to  the  worthy  individ- 
ual who  remains  steadfastly  with  one 
company. 

For  those  who  are  ambitious  for  promo- 
tion and  place,  Life  Insurance  offers  great 
inducements.  The  companies  are  actually 
hungry  for  real,  capable  men  and  women 
to  fill  responsible  positions.  The  compara- 
tive newness  of  the  business,  in  its  larger 
aspect,  as  practised  in  the  United  States  and 
the  Dominion  of  Canada,  has  created  a  short- 
age of  individuals  who  can  join  production 
with  executive  ability,  and  for  such  the  op- 
portunity is  ample, — greater,  in  fact,  than 
in  any  other  field  not  requiring  large  capital. 
Then  for  those  red-blooded  members  of 
society  who  have  the  constructive,  building 
disposition,  who  are  interested  in  something 

aside  from  the  humdrum,  trite,   everyday 

20 


OPPORTUNITY 

experience  of  their  fathers  and  grandfathers, 
and  who  do  not  desire  to  select  their  vocation 
a  la  "  rich  man — poor  man — beggarman— 
thief  —  doctor — lawyer — merchant — chief  " 
fashion,  Life  Insurance  holds  wonderful 
opportunities. 

Its  operations,  in  the  field,  have  been  char- 
acterized by  wasteful  and  unscientific  meth- 
ods. The  scope  for  originating  and  carrying 
out  modern  efficiency  methods  is  limitless. 
It  is  a  poor  job  for  the  individual  who  cannot 
self -inaugurate  something. 

Life  Insurance  enters  into  the  hearts  and 
homes  of  people  of  all  classes.  Therefore, 
viewed  in  the  light  of  the  grouping  of  society 
in  the  superficial,  or  outward  castes,  the  busi- 
ness has  a  wide  range  in  the  opportunity  for 
remunerative  employment  of  people  of  dif- 
ferent strata  of  business  and  social  caste. 
Those  familiar  with  the  needs  and  desires 
of  each  class  can  better  serve  that  class  in 
supplying  them  with  protection. 

The  history  of  the  most  efficient  company 

organization  has  proven,  conclusively,  the 

21 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

foregoing:  that  agents  of  moderate,  average 
and  phenomenal  ability  all  succeed  in  due 
proportion  when  properly  trained  and  gifted 
with  industry,  a  sound  mind  and  a  good 
heart. 

Why,  then,  with  all  this  opportunity  for 
accomplishment,  in  ethical  and  financial  up- 
lift, do  so  many  fail? 

The  reasons  are  public  aloofness,  unscien- 
tific methods  and  lack  of  time-accountability, 
together  with  the  fact  that  the  agent  must 
always  be  pulling  up-stream  in  keeping  at 
work.  However,  these  reasons  are  only  sur- 
face, and  not  fundamental.  The  real  reason 
so  many  fail  is  that  Life  Insurance  is  the 
"  acid  test  "  of  salesmanship. 

It  calls  for  superior  ability  in  discernment 
of  human  nature,  backed  by  industry  and 
intensive  power  to  sway  people  to  harmo- 
nious action.  Without  these,  continuous  and 
cumulative  success  is  impossible. 

It  has  been  shown  that  there  is  abundant 
opportunity  for  a  wide  range  of  individuals 

in  the  Life  Insurance  business ;  that  promo- 

22 


OPPORTUNITY 

tions  are  promised  and  remuneration,  in 
method  and  amount,  attractive;  that  oppor- 
tunity for  success  is  ample  for  those  of  aver- 
age ability,  and  large  for  those  of  large 
ability. 

More  important,  however,  is  the  fact  that 
the  business  embraces  or  calls  for  more  attri- 
butes of  human  responsiveness,  right  deal- 
ing, fair  dealing  and  square  dealing  than  any 
other  human  agency.  If  practised  as  it 
should  be  followed,  it  will  cultivate  a  logical 
mind,  analytical  wisdom  as  to  social  and 
economic  conditions,  and,  above  all,  and  more 
important  than  all,  a  disposition  to  love  and 
care  for  one's  fellows. 


CHAPTER  II 
WHO  SHOULD  BEGIN — WHEN,  AND  How 

I.    WHO  SHOULD  BEGIN 

IF  the  reader  is  impressed  with  the  senti- 
ment in  the  closing  words  of  the  preceding 
chapter,  he  then  possesses  one  of  the  requi- 
sites of  a  Life  Insurance  agent. 

It  is  folly  to  engage  in  the  work  without 
a  pulling  at  the  heart-strings  because  of  the 
great  human  side  of  the  business,  and  unless 
there  is  a  thorough  understanding  and  ap- 
preciation of  Life  Insurance,  as  a  world 
force,  in  its  economic  and  beneficent  relation 
to  humanity. 

Too  many  young  men  waste  time  "  feel- 
ing out  "  other  people  in  choosing  a  vocation. 
If  the  advice  of  someone  else  is  going  to  be 
taken  on  selecting  a  vocation,  keep  out  of 
Life  Insurance,  because  it  has  enough  fail- 
ures aboard  already.  It  takes  a  little  clear 
grit  to  break  into  the  Life  Insurance  pro- 
fession— it  is  no  place  for  a  molly-coddle. 

24 


WHO  SHOULD  BEGIN— WHEN  AND  HOW 

Then,  in  seeking  the  opinion  of  others, 
much  misinformation  is  acquired,  as  there 
are  many  individuals,  glib  of  tongue  but 
void  of  understanding,  who  scoff  at  the  busi- 
ness as  a  vocation. 

Self -analysis  should  be  used  liberally,  h» 
selecting  one's  life  work,  as  to  disposition 
and  capabilities.  However,  many  persons 
carry  self-analysis  and  inquiry  beyond  the 
necessary  limits  of  reason. 

By  the  same  token  that  a  person  can  do 
some  one  thing  successfully,  he  can  do  some 
other  thing  creditably,  with  the  application 
of  the  same  amount  of  energy  and  enterprise. 
It  is  not  the  intention  to  convey  the  idea  that 
a  good  blacksmith  would  make  a  painter  of 
works  of  art,  and  so  on,  but,  outside  the  fine 
arts  and  major  professions,  the  rule  laid 
down  does  apply. 

Life  Insurance,  as  a  vocation,  is  properly 
classed  in  a  twilight  zone  between  a  pro- 
fession and  ordinary  business,  embracing,  as 
it  does,  the  attributes  and  opportunities  of 
both.  It  is  a  poor  job  for  a  cold,  clammy 

25 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

individual,  with  a  sordid  ambition  and  a 
warped  soul.  It  is  a  business  where  person- 
ality counts — personality,  with  gentlemanly 
enthusiasm  outside,  and  quick  discernment 
of  human  nature,  plus  conviction,  inside. 

Where  doubt  exists  in  regard  to  becom- 
ing a  Life  Insurance  salesman,  study  the 
characteristics  of  Ex-presidents  Taft  and 
Roosevelt,  and  Ex-premier  Asquith  and  his 
successor,  Lloyd  George,  as  opposites,  and 
then  Woodrow  Wilson  as  a  composite,  in 
some  degree,  of  all  these  personalities. 

Mr.  Taft's  highly-specialized,  judicial 
mind,  lacking  executive  positiveness,  does 
not  possess  the  requisites  necessary  to  success 
in  Life  Insurance  field  work.  Mr.  Roose- 
velt, with  his  many-sidedness,  but  with  these 
qualities  toned  down,  is  fine.  Mr.  Asquith, 
with  his  great  judicial  and  parliamentary 
ability,  is  too  cold.  Lloyd  George,  in  quick 
grasp,  human  responsiveness  and  positive- 
ness,  is  ideal. 

Woodrow  Wilson  is  enough  of  a  com- 
posite to  not  be  set  aside  like  Taft  and 

26 


WHO  SHOULD  BEGIN—WHEN  AND  HOW 

Asquith,  and  too  austere  to  be  classed  with 
Roosevelt  or  Lloyd  George. 

It  is  the  intention  to  convey  to  the  reader 
that  personalities  resembling,  to  a  prepon- 
derating degree,  the  characteristics  of  Ex- 
president  Taft  and  Mr.  Asquith  are  not 
adaptable  to  the  business;  and  that  person- 
alities, with  a  leaning  toward  the  qualities  of 
Ex-president  Roosevelt  and  Lloyd  George, 
are  equipped  to  an  unusual  degree  for 
success. 

Furthermore,  that  there  are  a  large  num- 
ber of  individuals  who  possess  the  adapta- 
bility of  President  Wilson,  without  either 
the  preponderating  negative  qualities  of  a 
Taft  or  an  Asquith,  nor  the  overwhelming 
positive  requisites  of  a  Roosevelt  or  a  Lloyd 
George,  who  can  still  attain  very  creditable 
accomplishments. 

The  fact  should  be  clearly  visualized  that 
there  is  more  adaptability  in  the  human 
make-up  than  most  people  realize,  and  this 
should  not  be  overlooked,  especially  with 
young  people.  With  reasonable  adapta- 

27 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

bility,  opportunity  and  determination  are 
mighty  factors. 

The  author  is  firmly  convinced  that  a 
careful  study  of  the  foregoing  will  greatly 
aid  individuals  seeking  light  as  to  their  fit- 
ness or  adaptability  for  the  business  of  Life 
Insurance,  and  that  their  own  deliberative 
judgment,  exercised  by  such  process,  is  far 
more  valuable  than  a  hasty  conclusion 
reached  by  shopping  around  for  ideas. 

In  conclusion,  for  this  part,  remember 
that  there  is  an  opening  for  individuals  of 
moderate,  average  and  exceptional  ability, 
as  mentioned  in  the  first  chapter,  and  as  will 
be  more  clearly  shown  in  those  to  follow. 

II.   WHEN 

A  generation  ago,  young  men  at  the 
threshold  of  their  life's  work  rarely  entered 
the  business.  The  young  man  who  did  so 
was  the  exception,  not  the  rule.  It  was  com- 
monly supposed  that  a  young  man  could  not 
cope  with  the  difficulties  and  obstacles  to  be 
overcome,  in  lack  of  understanding  and  prej- 

28 


WHO  SHOULD  BEGIN—WHEN  AND  HOW 

udice  existing  in  the  public  mind.  It  was 
thought  necessary  to  employ,  as  agents, 
older  men  who  had  acquired  ability  to  meet 
and  overcome  difficulties.  This  led  to  the 
practice  of  recruiting  for  agents  from  among 
those  who  had  spent  years  in  other  fields  of 
work,  and  desired  to  change  to  something 
more  lucrative  and  congenial,  and  also  from 
the  ranks  of  failures  and  the  down-and-outs. 

This  was  a  baneful  practice,  and  it  has 
been  difficult  to  outgrow  the  evil.  When 
the  business  awoke  to  an  appreciation  of  its 
possibilities  for  young  men,  and  to  the  fact 
that  it  needed  their  fighting  qualities  and 
growing  propensities,  it  found  the  early 
practice  had  built  an  artificial  wall  to  keep 
out  these  young  men. 

However,  this  aloofness  is  rapidly  wear- 
ing away,  because  of  more  standardized 
methods  and  better  understanding.  Young 
men,  college  graduates,  and  all  those  with 
a  purposeful  attitude  toward  their  future 
find  a  ready  and  lucrative  market  for  their 

29 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

activities,  if  applied  with  zeal  and  deter- 
mination. 

It  is  entirely  fitting  that  young  men  should 
take  up  Life  Insurance  as  their  initial  work, 
and  follow  it  through  to  the  end  of  their  life's 
journey.  There  is  nothing  against,  and  every- 
thing in  favor  of,  such  a  practice,  as  in  all 
important  vocations.  They  should  begin 
when  young,  and  spend  their  building,  con- 
structive years  fitting  themselves  for  the  big 
things  of  place  and  accomplishment  which 
can  only  come  in  any  life  or  profession  by 
years  of  growth  and  development. 

Happily,  educational  institutions,  through 
their  own  vision  in  practicalizing  education, 
and  with  the  aid  of  leading  insurance  men, 
are  incorporating  Life  Insurance  in  their 
curricula,  so  that  graduates  are  better  fitted 
to  understand  Life  Insurance  as  an  economic 
force,  and  its  relation  to  them  as  a  means  of 
livelihood. 

Many  companies  and  large  agencies  have 
their  own  schools  of  insurance  and  salesman- 
ship, and  abundant  opportunity  is  given  the 

30 


WHO  SHOULD  BEGIN— WHEN  AND  HOW 

younger  generation  to  grasp  the  advantages 
which  the  business  offers.  The  training 
given  in  these  courses,  and  in  real  service,  is 
very  valuable,  even  if  the  recruit  should 
eventually  follow  some  other  calling. 

While  Life  Insurance  is  pre-eminently  a 
business  to  enter  while  young,  as  an  initial 
venture  no  hard-and-fast  rule  can  be  laid 
down.  Many  men  have  taken  up  the  work 
later  in  life,  because  of  its  freedom  of  time 
and  operation,  and  made  conspicuous  suc- 
cesses, but  these  same  men  would,  of  course, 
have  gone  much  further  had  they  applied 
their  activities  from  the  start. 

Therefore,  the  Life  Insurance  business 
should  be  taken  up  by  young  men — college 
graduates,  high  school  graduates,  or  other 
young  men  who  select  it  as  their  first  and 
only  vocation. 

III.     HOW 

Many  a  good  Life  Insurance  agent  has 
never  reached  a  reasonable  fruition  of  his 
powers,  or  has  left  the  business  as  a  total  or 
partial  failure,  because  of  a  poor  start. 

31 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

The  first  essential  for  a  beginner  is  to 
thoroughly  understand  the  business,  in  its 
broad  economic  aspects.  This  means  study 
at  the  start,  and  study  all  the  way  through 
to  the  end, — study  of  the  economic  and  be- 
neficent value  of  Life  Insurance,  study  of 
human  nature,  study  of  self  and  systems  of 
work  applicable  to  the  individual. 

The  agent  should  not  try  the  Tbusiness. 
It  should  be  taken  up  as  a  life's  work,  with 
a  determination  to  stick.  It  is  a  man's  job, 
and  will  not  mix  with  anything  else.  It  is 
ethically  and  fundamentally  wrong  to  mix 
it  with  anything  else. 

The  agent  should  be  ambitious  to  serve 
his  friends  and  acquaintances,  riot  to  prey 
upon  them.  The  things  shown  in  the  accom- 
panying diagram  should  be  clearly  visualized 
and  followed.  The  agent  should  learn  when 
to  talk,  and  when  not  to  talk.  He  should 
learn  to  arrange  interviews  to  best  bring  re- 
sults. Life  Insurance  should  be  regarded, 
and  sold,  as  a  conservation  of  man's  energy 
or  earning  power — as  live  insurance  for  live 

32 


WHO  SHOULD  BEGIN— WHEN  AND  HOW 

people.  Figuratively,  the  salesman  should 
look  through  a  man  like  an  X-ray,  and  see, 
beyond,  his  loved  ones,  or  business,  or  both, 
and  talk  protection  for  these,  not  just  selling 
arguments  to  put  dollars  in  his  own  pocket. 


This  efficiency  diagram  ia  constructed  on  the  theory  that  an  individual'! 
effort  for  success  should  be  dominated  by  the  idea  that  a  straight  line  is  th« 
shortest  distance  between  two  points. 

Point  E  is  an  individual's  visualized  ambition. 

The  straight  line  A-E  is  the  visualized  course 
that  this  individual  must  hold  in  mind. 

The  curved  line  is  the  general  course  that  a 
successful  individual  will  travel  who  keeps  in  mind 
3  33 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

the  visualized  point  and  indulges  in  directly  applied 
energy,  remembering  that  a  straight  line  is  the 
shortest  distance  between  two  points. 

A,  B,  C  and  D  represent  the  scope  of  an  indi- 
vidual's efforts,  practical  and  otherwise,  between 
just  existing,  A  to  D,  and  rising  to  maximum 
capacity,  A  and  C. 

C  is  the  highest  point  of  accomplishment  that  a 
given  individual  can  attain. 

The  dotted  lines  above  E  represent  the  actual 
course  of  a  successful  career  of  one  who  keeps  in 
mind  point  E,  and  works  in  accordance  with  curved 
line  A  and  E. 

Of  course,  the  curved  line  A  and  E  with  the 
successful  individual  actually  becomes  a  curved 
line  to  follow  the  course  of  one  of  the  dotted  lines 
above  E  or  A-7,  6,  etc.,  to  assumed  maximum, 
A  and  C. 

Dotted  lines  below  E,  and  between  E  and  D, 
represent  a  lessening  of  vigilance  and  efficiency. 
A  and  D  is  just  keeping  one's  head  above  water. 

Below  D  is  failure,  and  point  14  total  failure. 

A,  B  and  C  is  the  forbidden  zone. 

The  stars  represent  points  of  contact  of  an 
individual  when  he  is  working  inefficiently  or  in  an 
impractical  way.  Stars  in  the  forbidden  zone, 
bounded  by  A,  B  and  C,  represent  points  of  con- 
tact of  an  individual  where  he  is  wasting  his  energy 
entirely  because  of  being  outside  his  sphere  as  a 
means  to  the  end  to  be  accomplished. 

34 


WHO  SHOULD  BEGIN— WHEN  AND  HOW 

The  purpose  of  this  diagram  is  to  convey  the 
idea  that  so  many  people  are  constantly  working  in 
the  zone  A,  B  and  C,  and  represented  by  the  stars 
therein,  working  out  of  their  element,  indulging 
in  impractical  and  visionary  things  in  their  daily 
work. 

An  important  lesson  to  be  learned  from  the  dia- 
gram is  that  an  individual  will  always  reach  a 
higher  goal  than  the  objective,  provided  he  work 
constantly  for  an  objective  and  indulge  in  directly 
applied  energy,  eliminating  wasteful  and  impracti- 
cal endeavor. 

What  is  in  the  mind  of  the  agent  is  easily 
conveyed  to  the  prospect.  Therefore,  intelli- 
gent, sincere  and  sustained  effort  gets  cumu- 
lative results.  Many  men  drift  in  the  busi- 
ness. This  is  a  wicked  shame,  for  only  a 
small  percentage  of  people  are  adequately 
insured,  and  millions  come  into  an  insurable 
age  every  year. 

The  agent  should  not  drift  or  work  in  any 
hap-hazard  fashion.  He  should  respond  to 
the  time-accountability  system  of  an  organi- 
zation, and  be  severe  and  honest  with  him- 
self, striving  from  the  start  to  be  the  best 

35 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

Life  Insurance  agent  in  his  "  own  home 
town."  He  should  be  considerate  of  others, 
but  never  suppliant,  and  remember  the  in- 
scription on  the  Gates  of  Busyrane: 

"Be  Bold!" 

"  Be  Bold,  Be  Bold,  and  Evermore  Be  Bold !  " 

"Be  Not  Too  Bold!" 

An  agent  should  not  begin  with  the  idea 
that  he  is  going  to  make  a  fortune  the  first 
year,  nor  should  he  be  ambitious  to  succeed 
his  manager  or  be  president  of  the  company 
without  earning  those  jobs. 

One  of  the  greatest  difficulties  with  the 
younger  generation,  and  especially  college 
graduates,  is  a  too  impatient  and  arrogant 
attitude  toward  doing  the  work  of  an  appren- 
tice, and  in  not  wanting  to  work  and  wait  a 
sufficient  length  of  time  for  advancement.  In 
other  important  vocations!  or  professions, 
such  as  engineering,  banking,  law  and  medi- 
cine, few  men  attain  the  very  big  things  until 
nearly  forty  years  of  age,  and  in  the  major 


WHO  SHOULD  BEGIN— WHEN  AND  HOW 

professions  spend  years  and  money  in  prepa- 
ration. 

Yet,  thousands  of  Life  Insurance  agents 
have  tried  the  business  and  given  up  when 
they  did  not  succeed  the  first  six  months.  If 
a  college  graduate  has  spent  four  years  to 
prepare  his  mind  to  assimilate  big  things,  he 
has  a  missing  link  somewhere  if  he  is  not 
willing  to  spend,  if  necessary,  a  couple  of 
years  in  preparation  for  his  real  life's  work, 
in  the  actual  school  of  experience. 

Advancement  in  income,  or  to  managerial 
or  official  positions,  is  a  matter  of  evolution 
and  revolution.  No  one  ever  attains  to  a 
thing  worth  while  without  burning  up  a  tre- 
mendous amount  of  energy  during  some  par- 
ticular period. 

To  learn  to  do  anything  well  means  to  be 
"  Patient  as  Destiny,"  to  know  how  to  wait; 
not  sit  and  wait,  but  work  and  wait.  Success 
means  earnest,  manful  effort;  grim  energy 
dominated  by  a  personality  willing  to  take 
risks  by  crossing  bridges  and  burning  them 
en  route. 


CHAPTER  III 

SALESMANSHIP 

A  GOOD  substitute  should  be  found  for  the 
word  "  salesmanship  "  because  the  word,  or 
that  for  which  it  stands,  is  actually  in  disre- 
pute on  account  of  being  considered,  in  the 
minds  of  altogether  too  many  individuals,  as 
representing  a  sort  of  cunning,  the  possession 
of  which  is  rather  against,  than  for,  the  indi- 
vidual. Unless  this  condition  can  be  cor- 
rected so  that  the  meaning  is  interpreted  as 
being  a  high  order  of  approach,  which  results 
in  the  meeting  of  minds,  some  other  word 
which  better  comports  with  advanced  ideas 
on  selling  should  be  substituted. 

Small  consideration  should  be  given  the 
idea  that  only  a  favored  few  are  born  sales- 
men, because  only  the  unfavored  minority 
cannot  become  efficient  members  of  a  sales 
organization.  Every  individual  is  selling 
something  every  day  of  his  life.  A  good 
salesman  is  a  born  gentleman  who  is  not  lazy. 

38 


SALESMANSHIP 

All  human  accomplishment  hinges  around 
salesmanship.  Even  advertising  is  a  form 
of  salesmanship.  Salesmanship  is  driving 
power — militancy — not  the  noisy,  flamboy- 
ant kind,  but  that  born  of  industry,  enter- 
prise, determination  and  inherent  gentle- 
manly qualities. 

A  Life  Insurance  salesman  is  a  composite 
individual,  exercising  the  qualities  of  the 
ordinary  salesman,  plus  functions  of  the  lead- 
ing professions,  combined  with  the  knowl- 
edge of  the  economist  and  sociologist. 

Life  Insurance  salesmanship  has  been 
shunned  because  of  the  percentage  of  failures 
registered  by  those  who  engaged  in  the  work, 
and  because  of  the  common  misconception 
of  the  importance  and  dignity  of  the  business 
as  a  profession. 

Failures  in  salesmanship — not  alone  in 
Life  Insurance,  but  in  every  field — have  been 
multiplied  owing  to  the  lack  of  constructive 
sales  methods  in  the  decorum  employed  in 
daily  work,  and  the  unscientific  methods  of 
organizing  and  developing  sales  forces. 

39 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

That  more  failures,  in  proportion,  have 
occurred  in  the  Life  Insurance  business,  is 
due  to  intensifying  of  evils  existing  gener- 
ally, and  for  the  further  reason  that  the  Life 
Insurance  business  is  the  "  acid  test "  of 
all  salesmanship,  requiring  a  more  varied  and 
higher  order  of  ability  to  acquire  success. 

It  is  a  business  where  the  glib,  shallow  indi- 
vidual will  not  last.  In  Life  Insurance,  and 
in  every  line  of  business,  the  American  peo- 
ple should  get  away  from  the  idea  that  sales- 
manship is  just  the  union  of  buyer  and  seller, 
through  word  of  mouth.  Salesmanship  is  a 
composite  idea  in  the  ethics,  psychology,  logic 
and  economy  of  marketing  all  commodities. 
It  is  a  local,  national  and  international  mat- 
ter of  far-reaching  importance.  It  strikes 
at  the  very  heart  of  the  nation,  through  every 
individual  enterprise,  corporate  entity,  and 
public  servant,  and  is  vital  in  every  business, 
affecting  every  one,  from  the  most  humble 
employee  to  the  proprietor. 

We  need  more  constructive  salesmanship. 
More  constructive  salesmanship,  in  ordinary 

40 


SALESMANSHIP 

commercial  lines,  means  better  and  more 
adaptable  goods,  greater  efficiency  in  manu- 
facture, more  attractive  packages,  prompt 
delivery  and  broader  fiscal  policies.  As  an- 
other result,  our  own  public  and  the  foreign 
buyer  will  be  met  by  a  salesforce  that  has 
been  selected  and  instructed  on  more  stand- 
ardized and  enlightened  methods. 

Constructive  salesmanship  in  the  Life  In- 
surance business  necessitates  the  cultivation 
of  the  idea  and  practice  of  selling  one's  brains 
by  a  sagacious  method  of  approach  and  pub- 
licity, just  as  the  lawyer  and  the  doctor  em- 
ploy in  building  a  successful  practice  in  their 
professions. 

The  minister  or  college  professor  who  in- 
dulges in  a  little  well-ordered  publicity,  and 
brushes  up  against  the  public,  is  the  one  who 
receives  calls  to  greater  fields  o€  activity. 
They  make  more  money  and  do  more  good 
for  humanity  than  their  more  silent  brethren. 

Life  Insurance  has  been  likened  to  all  four 
of  these  professions,  and  it  does  embrace 
most  of  the  attributes  of  them  all. 

41 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

Some  feel  that  the  agent  is  made  too  ideal- 
istic by  this  kind  of  education,  and  that  there 
is  engendered  in  him  the  idea  of  sitting 
around  waiting  for  people  to  come  to  him 
for  business,  instead  of  indulging,  as  he  must, 
in  unremitting  toil. 

If  the  agent  is  thoroughly  imbued  with 
the  economic  and  beneficent  value  of  Life 
Insurance  and  the  preposterousness  of  the 
layman  feeling  that  he  is  not  carrying  a  mes- 
sage of  great  business  and  sentimental  value ; 
if  he  is  adequately  trained  and  inspired  with 
habits  of  systematic  work,  and  imbued  with 
the  efficacy  of  time-accountability;  and, 
finally,  made  to  realize  that,  in  his  initial 
work,  he  must  be  ready  to  overcome  huge  ob- 
stacles and  to  fight  discouragements,  there 
cannot  then  be  builded  too  idealistic  a  struc- 
ture in  his  mind  as  to  the  professional  side  of 
what  he  is  doing,  nor  as  to  the  monumental 
value  of  the  system  of  Legal  Reserve  Life 
Insurance. 

A  salesman  cannot  succeed,  in  any  voca- 
tion, without  exercising  an  enormous  amount 

42 


SALESMANSHIP 

of  physical  and  mental  energy.  Many  sales- 
men are  prone  to  overdo  the  physical,  and 
neglect  the  mental  development  of  their 
work. 

Salesmanship,  especially  Life  Insurance 
salesmanship,  is  not  a  matter  of  brute  force 
or  series  of  strong-arm  jabs.  It  is  the  ability 
to  "  nose  out  "  prospects  and  close  them  with 
the  finesse  of  a  diplomat. 

In  the  "  Letters  from  a  Self-made  Mer- 
chant to  his  Son,"  by  George  Lorimer 
(Small,  Maynard  and  Company),  the  very 
pertinent  expression  is  used:  "  A  real  sales- 
man is  one-part  talk  and  nine-parts  judg- 
ment; and  he  uses  the  nine-parts  of  judg- 
ment to  tell  when  to  use  the  one-part  of  talk." 

The  truism  cannot  be  too  often  told  that  a 
salesman  should  know  his  own  goods  thor- 
oughly, and  those  of  his  competitor  as  well. 
It  is  quite  important,  however,  that  he  should 
learn  the  art  of  creating  sales  by  playing-up 
the  strong  points  of  his  own  goods,  and  not 
the  weak  ones  of  his  competitors'. 

The  way  to  be  positive  is — to  be  positive 

43 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

and  not  negative.  Tearing-down,  or  traduc- 
ing, is  bound  to  be  negative.  Even  where 
actual  comparisons  are  to  be  made,  by  the  use 
of  legitimate  adroitness,  the  negative  exist- 
ing on  the  opposing  side  can  be  shown  by  a 
strong  playing-up  of  the  positive  or  superior 
qualities  of  one's  own  article. 

The  psychology  of  the  written  and  spoken 
word,  both  in  what  is  actually  expressed,  to 
the  sequential  arrangement  of  ideas,  is  ex- 
tremely important.  Psychology  is  a  great 
aid  in  the  study  and  discernment  of  human 
nature. 

A  great  many  instructors  on  salesmanship 
give  the  wrong  "  mind  slant "  to  their  stu- 
dents by  instruction  in  regard  to  how  to  shake 
hands  or  look  at  an  individual,  incorporating 
statements  about  the  signature  on  the  dotted 
line,  and  other  weakening  and  obsolete  or 
hurtful  expressions. 

A  studied  approach  is  a  poor  approach. 
Inherent  good  breeding,  not  ball-room  ethics, 
will  tell  a  real  salesman  how  to  approach 
each  client  or  customer.  Originality  of  ap- 

44 


SALESMANSHIP 

proach,  thought  and  expression  in  each  indi- 
vidual interview  is  the  real  way.  No  really 
efficient  salesman  will  shake  hands  until  the 
one  on  whom  he  is  calling  indicates  a  desire 
or  readiness  to  grasp  his  hand. 

Furthermore,  a  keen,  intuitive  reader  of 
men  will  never  stand  near  enough  to  his  pros- 
pect but  that  the  other  must  take  a  step  for- 
ward, if  desirous  of  a  cordial  handshake 
greeting. 

This  unobtrusive  method  of  approaching 
men  is  advisable  not  alone  because  of  the  of- 
fensiveness  of  breathing  in  one's  face,  but  it 
has  to  do  with  the  very  fundamental  fact 
that  men  of  affairs — many  of  them  justly, 
though  some  falsely — hold  a  somewhat  ex- 
alted idea  of  the  sacredness  of  the  space, 
about  six  feet  in  diameter,  immediately  sur- 
rounding their  personality. 

The  humor  of  this  exclusiveness,  in  many 
cases,  does  not  alter  the  advisability  of  re- 
specting it. 

The  old  silk-hatted,  rough-and-tough,  Bill- 
and-Joe  type  of  salesman  is  rapidly  giving 

45 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

away  to  the  quiet,  gentlemanly,  positive  in- 
dividual who,  by  concentration,  study  and 
enterprise,  becomes  a  dynamic  force,  with  a 
come-back  that  is  stronger  and  more  skilful 
each  time. 

A  Life  Insurance  agent  should  learn  to 
develop  a  dual-minded  process  of  canvassing 
a  client.  This  means  to  acquire  the  faculty 
of  talking  enthusiastically,  forcefully  and 
convincingly  about  a  proposition,  and  still 
observe  the  client  thoroughly,  without  his 
becoming  aware  that  he  is  being  watched. 

Here  again,  the  instinctive,  intuitive  knowl- 
edge of  human  nature,  and  a  quick  grasp 
of  what  pleases  or  jars,  rather  than  a  cold 
analysis  or  staring  of  men  out  of  counte- 
nance, makes  for  large  and  continued  success. 

Salesmanship  is  a  great  vocation,  calling 
for  study  in  and  out  of  one's  particular  line. 
Life  Insurance  salesmanship  rises  to  the 
plane  of  a  profession,  and  further  discussion 
of  specific  methods  properly  comes  under  the 
three  succeeding  chapters. 


CHAPTER  IV 

SYSTEM  AND  EFFICIENCY 

THERE  is  much  scoffing  at  what  is  charac- 
terized as  overplaying  of  the  words  "  system" 
and  "  efficiency."  In  most  instances  those 
prone  to  ridicule  the  words  and  their  modern 
application  are  the  most  in  need  of  the  things 
these  words  imply. 

Fathers  and  mothers,  educational  institu- 
tions— public  and  private,  common  school 
and  collegiate — have  been  turning  loose  on 
the  public  each  year  a  few  millions  of  young 
men  and  young  women  who  are  wholly  un- 
fitted for  the  practical  affairs  of  life.  The 
United  States  is  sorely  in  need  of  speeding 
up  on  system  and  efficiency,  to  co-ordinate  its 
internal  force  by  a  proper  and  adequate 
union  of  man-power  and  natural  advantages. 

It  is  no  idle  statement  to  assert  that  the 
waste  in  time,  natural  resources  and  lack  of 
scientific  methods,  of  which  the  country  is 

47 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

guilty  each  year,  is  enormous,  and  far  more 
than  we  actually  create  in  new  value. 

The  Life  Insurance  business,  because  of 
the  newness  and  peculiar  nature  of  the  work, 
has  been  conspicuous  in  its  hit-or-miss  meth- 
ods in  field  work.  The  commission  method 
of  remuneration  was  not  conducive  to  the 
control  of  agents  along  efficiency  lines.  But 
wherever  an  individual  for  himself,  or  a  com- 
pany or  manager,  laid  down  time-accounta- 
bility and  reporting  system  along  lines  por- 
trayed by  the  blank  as  printed  on  the  oppo- 
site page,  better  and  increased  results  have 
been  realized. 

During  the  last  decade,  the  business  has 
been  revolutionized  and  is  constantly  moving 
to  a  higher  level  by  the  incorporating  of  sys- 
tem and  efficiency  plans,  and  in  instructing 
the  agent  how  to  best  employ  his  time. 

In  a  real,  up-to-date  agency  organization, 
the  manager  makes  it  his  business  to  know 
when  and  how  his  associates  start  each  day's 
work,  and  just  how  they  apply  their  activ- 
ities during  the  day.  Where  a  large  number 

48 


AGENT'S  WEEKLY  REPORT 

The  record  of  my  work  for  week  ending  month 

day year is  given  below: 

I  made ....  return  calls  on  Monday, ....  Tuesday -, 

Wednesday, Thursday, , 

Friday, Saturday. 

I  made new  calls  on  Monday, Tuesday, 

Wednesday, Thursday, 

Friday, Saturday. 

I  wrote applications,  amounting  to  $ 

insurance,  of  which  $......  were  Endowment, 

$ Limited  Payment  Life,  $ 

Ordinary  Life,  and  $ Term. 

The  Premiums  for  the  week  amounted  to  $...... 

of  which  $ is  Cash  settlement  and  $ 

Time  settlement. 
I  have new  premiums  over-due  amounting 

to$ 

/  have.  .  .  .renewal  premiums  over-due  amounting 

to$ 

7  turned  in  during  the  week  with  those  accompany- 
ing this  report  a  total  of.  .  .  .new  records  giving 

age  and  date  of  birth. 
Remarks  . 


Signed Agent. 

(The  office  will  be  glad  to  have  the  Agent  make  any  special 
comment  under  "Remarks"  which  he  may  deem  of  assistance 
to  me  in  arriving  at  a  comprehensive  understanding  of  his  work. 
4  49 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

of  men  is  congregated  in  one  civic  center, 
they  are,  in  some  instances,  and  should  be  in 
all,  made  to  report  at  the  office  in  the  morn- 
ing, just  as  the  office  employees.  The  gath- 
ering in  this  manner,  at  an  early  hour,  as  a 
morning  identification  with  their  real  job  in 
life  and  their  co-workers,  gives  a  much 
greater  impetus  for  the  day,  and  is  more 
business-like  than  to  start  off  in  an  aimless 
way,  like  a  curbstone  operator. 

In  this  matter  of  system  and  efficiency, 
too  few  connect  the  words,  or  that  which 
they  imply,  with  results  and  accomplishment. 
Any  system  or  efficiency  method  which  an 
individual  applies  to  himself,  but  which  does 
not  raise  him  to  a  higher  level  in  elimination 
of  lost  motion  and  increased  results,  is  the 
wrong  method,  or  there  is  something  out  of 
joint  with  the  individual.  Frequently  both 
the  plan  and  the  individual  are  wrong,  and 
this  is  where  the  general  agent  or  salesman- 
ager  comes  in. 

Notwithstanding  the  assertion  made  in 
the  opening  of  this  chapter,  it  is  true  that 

50 


SYSTEM  AND  EFFICIENCY 

many  overdo  the  application  of  system.  In 
such  cases,  system  ceases  to  be  efficiency. 
Efficiency,  in  the  Life  Insurance  business,  is 
systematic  conduct  of  one's  work  in  looking 
after  detail,  employment  of  time  and  appli- 
cation of  energy.  The  injection  of  too  much 
detail  means  waste  of  time  and  misapplied 
energy.  Much  can  be  drawn  from  the 
"  Key  "  appearing  on  page  52. 

The  statement  has  been  made,  in  a  previ- 
ous chapter,  that  Life  Insurance  is  in  a  twi- 
light zone  between  a  profession  and  ordinary 
business.  This  is  literally  true,  and  because 
of  this  fact,  the  successful  operation  of  the 
business  calls  for  more  than  ordinary  mind 
development  or  mental  efficiency. 

The  most  capable  producers  and  managers 
are  fairly  agreed  upon  the  absolute  necessity 
of  time-accountability,  systematic  plans  of 
work,  training  for  efficiency,  and  a  much 
wider  diffusion  of  rules  and  instructions  in 
the  realization  of  more  directly  applied 
energy  and  results. 

However,  in  the  last  analysis,  they  recog- 

51 


SUCCESS 


You  can  make 
changes  in  your 
work  that  will  add 
to  your  efficiency 
and  increase  your 


In  getting  off  a 
street  car  push  the 
button  and  then 
walk  to  the  rear 
platform  and  push 
it  again  to  cinch  the 
car's  stopping. 

Most  men  only 
push  the  button 
once.  Think  this 
over.  Make  sure  in 


each  thing. 

Be  TTtorougJt. 

Most  men  leave 
the  things  undone 
that  impress  the 
other  fellow  the 
most,  or  only  do 
half  enough  of  what 
they  do. 

Be  strong  on  the 
return.  The  re- 
bounding force  is 
what  makes  you 
plough  through. 

Ent  husias  m' 
makes  you  arrive. 


SYSTEM  AND  EFFICIENCY 

nize  and  acknowledge  that  what  an  agent 
carries  in  his  mind  each  day,  which  impels 
him  to  action,  in  both  the  small  and  large 
things,  is  of  vastly  more  importance  than  all 
the  card  systems  and  other  memoranda 
human  ingenuity  can  devise.  The  mind,  that 
eternal  structure  for  God's  greatest  handi- 
work, is  the  all-powerful  instrument  for 
greater  system  and  efficiency  in  the  business 
of  Life  Insurance.  The  agent  needs  to  cul- 
tivate his  mind,  in  and  out  of  business,  keep- 
ing always  a  close  association  of  this  develop- 
ment with  the  obtaining  of  increased  results, 
or,  what  is  better,  more  expert  and  adequate 
service  to  patrons. 

It  is  not  the  purpose  here  to  lay  down  any 
prescribed  plan  for  success.  Such  details  as 
"  route  work,"  '  joint  work,"  and  class  and 
individuals  upon  whom  one  should  call,  are 
matters  to  be  worked  out  by  the  individual 
and  his  company  or  organization. 

Agents,  to  become  properly  systematic 
and  efficient,  should  have  a  self-inaugurated 
plan  laid  out  to  concentrate  and  not  scatter 

53 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

or  dissipate  their  energy,  and  should  ever 
work  to  a  higher  level,  not  only  in  the  qual- 
ity of  service  which  they  render,  but  in  grow- 
ing to  increased  production,  remembering 
always  that  the  way  to  grow  to  big  things  is 
not  to  neglect  the  small  ones  on  the  way. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE  STANDARDIZED  REPRESENTATIVE 

IT  is  not  sufficient  that  the  agent  be  actu- 
ated by  honorable  motives,  but,  coupled  with 
high  purposes  there  must  be  sound  reason- 
ing, founded  on  a  careful  study  of  Life  In- 
surance as  applied  to  business  and  social 
economics. 

Life  Insurance,  considered  from  a  true 
perspective,  is  conservation  of  human  life — 
the  offset  to  man's  earning  power.  Those 
who  carry  its  message  to  the  people  are  en- 
gaged in  an  important  work. 

The  selling  of  a  Life  Insurance  policy, 
under  proper  conditions,  is  not  merely  col- 
lecting a  premium  or  obtaining  a  signature. 
These  things  are  important  incidents  to  the 
transaction,  but  they  should  be  accompanied 
by  a  service  predicated  entirely  on  conditions 
that  are  best  adapted  to  the  signer  and  payer. 

To  have  the  sale  of  a  Life  Insurance  policy 

55 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

accompanied  by  such  suggestions,  recom- 
mendations and  control  as  will  conform  to 
the  principles  laid  down,  requires  a  standard- 
ized representative. 

A  standardized  representative  is  one  who 
has  embraced  the  Life  Insurance  business, 
specializing  in  that  one  vocation.  He  is  one 
who  serves  an  apprenticeship  and  builds, 
by  study  and  hard  work,  to  the  point  of 
knowledge  and  experience  where  he  will  be 
equipped  to  guide  and  serve  each  individual 
for  the  latter' s  best  interests,  considered 
singly  and  in  relation  to  general  principles 
of  economics. 

The  Life  Insurance  agent  meets  with  all 
classes  of  people.  He  must  be  acquainted 
with  the  foibles  of  people  up  and  down  the 
social  and  business  scale.  It  is  his  proper 
function  to  guide  and  control  people,  indi- 
vidually and  in  groups.  If  sales  are  obtained 
by  tricky,  bull-dozing  or  begging  methods, 
the  transactions  are  not  healthy  ones,  the 
agent  is  an  undesirable  representative  or  citi- 
zen, and  his  life  is  short.  If  people  are  im- 

56 


STANDARDIZED  REPRESENTATIVE 

pelled  to  embrace  the  benefits  of  Life  Insur- 
ance through  a  method  of  guidance — and 
they  need  to  be  guided,  and  should  be  im- 
pelled, or  even  compelled  to  act  by  a  superior 
understanding  and  finesse — wholesome  and 
cumulative  results  follow.  Such  transactions 
can  only  be  the  work  of  a  standardized 
representative. 

Existing  laws  for  appointing,  and  the 
practice  of  companies  and  managers  in  se- 
lecting agents,  have  permitted  an  undue 
number  of  agents  who  are  unfitted,  in  mental 
equipment  and  training,  to  engage  in  the 
business. 

There  are  two  important  conclusions  to  be 
drawn  from  the  foregoing  statement.  In  the 
first  place,  laws  should  be  enacted  which  lay 
down  an  educational  standard  for  those  who 
engage  in  so  important  a  work  as  the  busi- 
ness of  Life  Insurance,  and,  secondly,  only 
the  very  highest  standards  should  be  applied 
and  maintained  in  the  selection  and  training 
of  agents. 

Incident  to  these  things  is  the  fact  that 

57 


ntage 
Renew 
ersion 


1 

2 

8 


3   5    §    o1  £ 
£U    ^  nS  ^ 


00    OS    O 


•I 

II 

•s  a 


S-g 

<u  o 


59 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

it  is  highly  incumbent  upon  educational  in- 
stitutions— a  duty  they  owe  the  public  sup- 
porting them — that  all  such  institutions  make 
a  wider  diffusion  of  the  principles  and  prac- 
tices of  Life  Insurance  an  important  part 
of  their  programs. 

Furthermore,  there  is  great  need,  and 
abundant  opportunity  for  substituting  the 
standardized  representatives  for  the  riff-raff 
already  engaged  in  the  work,  and,  while  the 
insurance  in  force  looms  large,  in  black-and- 
white  figures,  the  amount  as  sold  is  only  a 
small  percentage  of  the  actual  protection 
that  could,  and  should,  be  carried  by  the 
people  of  the  United  States  and  Canada. 

The  evolution  of  the  Life  Insurance  agent 
during  the  last  generation,  and  especially 
the  last  decade,  is  both  interesting  and  re- 
markable. Those  who  are  acquainted  with 
conditions  thirty  and  forty  years  ago,  and 
even  some  who  know  rural  conditions  to- 
day, are  familiar  with  the  country  lawyer, 
with  his  "  Three-ninety  "  office  equipment, 
and  the  doctor,  with  his  rusty  instruments, 
not  even  fit  for  operating  upon  a  pig. 

60 


STANDARDIZED  REPRESENTATIVE 

To-day,  even  in  the  most  remote  com- 
munities, there  is  found  the  keen  country 
lawyer,  in  his  neat,  book-lined  office,  and 
this  lawyer  gets  the  best  business  in  his  com- 
munity, and  reaches  out  into  surrounding 
territory. 

His  competitor,  with  the  "  Three-ninety  " 
office  equipment,  and  real  estate,  fire  insur- 
ance, life  insurance,  job-lot  aspect  of  his 
office,  is  city  justice,  and  probably  wears  a 
celluloid  collar. 

In  like  manner,  the  physician  of  the  new 
school  living  in  a  rural  community  has  an 
up-to-date  office,  and  is  equipped  to  serve 
humanity  with  neither  rusty  instruments  nor 
dusty  mind.  This  physician,  like  the  lawyer, 
is  consulted  in  all  important  and  critical  cases 
in  his  immediate  community,  and  each  year 
draws  a  circle  of  greater  circumference  in 
extending  his  more  modern  practice  and 
service. 

The  evolution  of  the  Life  Insurance  agent 
is  in  the  same  direction.  A  wonderful  ad- 
vancement has  been  effected  in  recent  years. 

61 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

The  reorganization  and  standardization  is 
going  forward  with  each  succeeding  year. 

The  Life  Insurance  agent  of  the  right  sort 
— a  much  abused  individual — has  a  place, 
and  a  very  important  one,  in  the  world's 
work.  His  services,  given  to  the  policy- 
holder  by  personal  contact  in  the  field,  are 
almost  as  necessary  as  the  business  itself. 

Religion,  medicine,  laws,  education  and 
banking,  as  great  principles,  have  little  force 
without  the  ministering  angels  and  master- 
minds, representing  these  great  callings, 
dotted  over  the  world  in  close  contact  with 
the  people. 

Life  Insurance  is  an  absolute  analogy  in 
logic,  and  has  been  so  proven  in  practice  in 
most  of  the  enlightened  countries.  Wher- 
ever the  business  has  been  attempted  with- 
out the  representative  in  the  field,  no  results 
worth  while  to  the  people  have  been  attained, 
and  where  the  non-standardized  representa- 
tive, or  the  weak,  unreliable  agent  has  pre- 
vailed, only  inadequate  results  and  poor  ser- 
vice have  been  the  outcome. 

62 


STANDARDIZED  REPRESENTATIVE 

In  the  two  succeeding  chapters  it  will  be 
seen  that  there  is  ample  opportunity  for  the 
standardized  agent  to  advance  to  official  and 
managerial  positions.  However,  with  the 
broadening  of  the  protective  features  of  Life 
Insurance,  in  touching  the  people  from  so 
many  different  angles,  in  the  home  or  busi- 
ness, there  is  not  much  advancement,  if  any, 
over  the  place  of  the  standardized  representa- 
tive in  the  field,  in  attainment  of  prestige, 
profit  or  service. 

Finally,  it  should  be  borne  in  mind  by  the 
individual  at  the  threshold  of  his  life's  work 
— whether  college  graduate  or  otherwise — 
that  to  become  a  standardized  representative 
in  Life  Insurance  there  is  not  just  the  op- 
portunity, nor  the  necessity,  but  the  abso- 
lute demand  that  such  individual  broaden  his 
mind,  by  reading  standard  literature,  and 
otherwise  liberally  indulging  in  self -culture, 
in  storing  information  in  regard  to  industrial, 
economic  and  sociological  conditions,  to- 
gether with  a  wide  fund  of  knowledge  about 
the  Life  Insurance  business  itself. 

63 


CHAPTER  VI 

GENERAL,  AGENCY  on  ORGANIZATION 
METHODS 

AT  a  meeting  of  agents  in  a  large  Eastern 
city  not  many  years  ago,  a  General  Agent, 
whose  Organization  had  adopted  somewhat 
advanced  methods,  was  asked:  "  Where  did 
you  get  your  ideas  on  Agency  building? " 
He  said,  in  replying,  "  Before  I  became  Gen- 
eral Agent  I  worked  for  two  others,  and 
whenever  I  am  confronted  by  a  knotty  prob- 
lem, I  try  to  remember  what  they  did,  and 
then  do  exactly  the  opposite." 

Dotted  over  the  country,  there  are  a  goodly 
number  of  Agency  Organizations  that  have 
incorporated  system  and  efficiency  methods 
into  their  business  to  such  a  degree  as  to 
make  some  of  them  almost  models.  How- 
ever, all  over  the  territory  there  is  more  than 
abundant  opportunity  for  exercising  prac- 
tical ideas  and  imaginative  genius,  in  Organ- 

64 


GENERAL  AGENCY  METHODS 

ization  building,  in  methods  of  selection  and 
training  of  agents,  departmentizing,  and  the 
scientific  arrangement  of  office  floor  plan. 

This  chapter  of  the  book  is  difficult  be- 
cause of  the  different  plans  under  which  com- 
panies operate  in  the  field.  Some  companies 
operate  under  the  General  Agency  plan,  put- 
ting a  man  in  control  of  the  field  on  a  com- 
mission basis,  with  very  broad  discretionary 
powers  so  long  as  he  conforms  to  right  stand- 
ards and  the  rules  of  the  company.  Others 
place  salaried  managers  in  control  of  states 
or  districts,  without  any  commission  compen- 
sation whatever.  Then  some  companies  have 
a  manager  who  is  on  a  salaried  basis  and 
whose  duties  and  restrictions  are  more  akin 
to  an  exclusive  salaried  representative,  but 
who  is  allowed  a  commission,  under  certain 
conditions,  and  a  bonus  for  business  written 
by  his  entire  organization. 

As  a  still  further  handicap  in  adequately 
covering  the  situation,  there  is  a  very  wide 
line  of  difference  between  companies  in  the 
amount  of  territory  given  to  a  General 

5  65 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

Agent,  or  salaried  manager  to  supervise. 
Naturally,  the  same  broad  business  policy 
which  should  dominate  an  organization  con- 
trolling a  large  civic  centre,  or  a  large  ter- 
ritory, would  be  like  Lincoln's  monkey- 
weighed  down  with  too  much  tail — for  an 
organization  controlling  only  a  small  city  or 
limited  rural  district. 

It  is  the  purpose  to  visualize  what  is  prac- 
tical in  a  good-sized  organization,  to  show 
the  business-building  possibilities  for  an  in- 
dividual with  ambition  and  a  constructive 
mind.  The  natural  presumption  is  that  a 
man  will  not  be  given  a  managerial  position 
until  he  has  learned  methods  of  system  and 
efficiency  and  become  a  standardized  repre- 
sentative, as  outlined  in  the  two  preceding 
chapters.  If  a  man  is  starting  in  the  retail 
or  wholesale  trade,  or  undertaking  a  manu- 
facturing proposition,  he  first  gets  a  plant 
or  building  in  which  to  operate.  So  the  first 
thing  necessary  for  a  manager  is  an  office; 
an  office  scientifically  arranged,  with  a  proper 


f\ 


n 


GENERAL  AGENCY  METHODS 

floor  plan  for  the  best  convenience  of  cus- 
tomers and  the  health  and  efficiency  of 
employees. 

The  diagram  of  the  floor  plan  of  a  real 
office,  given  on  the  accompanying  insert, 
shows  a  very  practical  arrangement  of  three 
thousand  and  fifty  square  feet. 

The  arrangement  and  equipment  of  an 
office,  in  behalf  of  the  public,  agents,  de- 
partment heads  and  clerks,  is  very  important. 
Both  have  been  much  neglected  It  is  not 
necessary  to  be  extravagant  to  conform  to 
an  arrangement  which  is  both  practical  and 
attractive.  Neither  must  an  office  be  very 
large,  or  as  large  as  the  one  here  illustrated, 
to  avoid  the  appearance  of  a  hodge-podge 
arrangement. 

It  is  necessary,  in  Organization  building, 
to  have  agents.  That  is  the  main  purpose 
of  a  manager  or  General  Agent's  position. 
Selecting  men,  therefore,  is  the  all-impor- 
tant thing,  because  they  not  only  build  the 
business,  but  are  the  ones  who  are  nearest 
the  public,  to  protect  and  give  them  service. 

67 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

If  the  secret  of  selecting  men  were  known, 
and  could  be  copyrighted  and  sold,  the  pos- 
sessor of  the  secret  would  have  John  D. 
Rockefeller  and  Copper  King  Clarke  look- 
ing like  door-step  beggars.  It  is  not  know- 
ing who  to  hire  and  who  to  fire,  or  when  to 
hire  and  when  to  fire,  that  is  the  cause  of 
great  worriment,  not  only  in  the  Life  Insur- 
ance business,  but  in  every  other  line. 

If  a  General  Agent  has  really  earned  his 
job,  he  is  a  very  good  judge  of  human  nature, 
up  to~a  certain  point.  He  knows,  by  a  lib- 
eral knowledge  and  use  of  psychology,  and  a 
limited  knowledge  and  use  of  phrenology, 
how  to  size  up  men.  As  to  their  immediate 
thoughts  and  disposition,  he  is  an  adept,  but 
he  has  not  acquired  occult  power  which  will 
enable  him  to  look  forward  to  next  week, 
next  month,  next  year  or  the  year  after,  and 
know,  with  any  degree  of  certainty,  what 
will  then  be  the  "  mind  slant "  of  an 
individual. 

There  is  probably  no  test  which  can  be  ap- 
plied with  any  degree  of  certainty,  and  the 

68 


GENERAL  AGENCY  METHODS 

only  formula  worth  giving,  if  any  be  at  all 
worth  while,  is  the  ordinary  admonition  that 
men  should  be  selected  to  engage  in  the  Life 
Insurance  business  by  a  limited  phrenological 
test,  in  observing  the  shape  of  their  head, 
ears,  neck  and  contour  of  features.  Men 
should  never  be  employed  unless  they  pos- 
sess industrious,  gentlemanly  qualities,  and 
indicate  a  strong  leaning  toward  the  business. 

Agents,  who  give  promise  of  conforming 
to  the  standards  and  suggestions  contained 
in  the  five  preceding  chapters  of  this  book, 
should  be  employed — that  is,  because  they  see 
an  opportunity,  are  fit  to  begin,  enter  at 
the  right  time  and  in  the  right  way,  and  give 
promise,  by  exercising  constructive  salesman- 
ship, and  by  system  and  efficiency,  of  be- 
coming standardized  representatives. 

It  is  absolutely  necessary  to  inculcate  in 
agents  the  idea  of  service,  or  the  altruistic- 
side  of  the  business — that  an  individual  can- 
not take  more  out  of  a  thing  than  he  puts 
into  it,  in  honest,  manly  effort. 

69 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

Agents  should  be  thoroughly  equipped  to 
judge  properly  in  giving  each  policyholder 
the  right  policy,  best  suited  to  the  client's 
needs.  It  should  be  borne  in  mind  that  some 
agents  work  better  in  pairs,  and  that  some 
should,  or  should  not  do  "  route  "  work  (that 
is,  work  by  prescribed  rule  in  canvassing  a 
district,  or  building) . 

All  agents  should  be  held  to  a  reporting 
system,  after  some  such  fashion  as  illustrated 
by  the  blank  in  Chapter  IV,  page  49.  All 
should  be  held  to  strict  accountability  in  the 
matter  of  time.  This  does  not  mean  that  the 
freedom  which  the  business  gives  should  be 
taken  away.  It  means  that  there  should  be 
such  time  of  arriving  at  the  office  in  the  morn- 
ing, and  accountability  during  the  day,  as 
is  necessary  to  attain  success  and  give  the  im- 
pression to  associates  and  clients  of  business- 
like standards. 

Agents  must  be  taught  their  responsibility 
in  regard  to  both  clients  and  company  in 
the  collection  of  premiums ;  that  their  obliga- 
tion is  just  as  great  to  the  policyholders  and 

70 


GENERAL  AGENCY  METHODS 

companies  in  future  premiums  as  in  the  first 
one. 

Their  fiduciary  responsibility  is  great,  and 
in  all  cases  moneys  received  from  policy- 
holders  should  be  kept  entirely  separate  from 
personal  funds.  Above  all  things,  they 
should  be  taught  the  iniquity  of  rebating; 
that  they  can  only  conform  to  moral  stand- 
ards and  legal  enactment  by  an  absolute  ad- 
herence to  the  practice  of  collecting  full 
premiums,  to  the  last  cent,  in  every  single 
transaction. 

Rebating  has  the  same  effect  upon  the  effi- 
ciency of  the  agent  as  an  immoderate  use  of 
liquor.  He  may  be  inspired  momentarily 
by  success,  thus  disreputably  attained,  but  he 
suffers  reaction  in  proportion.  He  soon  is 
incapable  of  attempting  a  difficult  transac- 
tion without  the  use  of  this  false  stimulant, 
and  finally  is  incapable  of  doing  anything 
creditable  to  his  calling.  No  matter  what  a 
man's  views  may  be  as  to  the  use  of  liquor, 
if  he  is  honest  with  himself,  he  knows  that  the 

last  thing  he  should  attempt  is  an  important 

71 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

transaction  when  using  it  in  any  form.  Also, 
that  a  hard,  effective  day's  work  can  never  be 
performed  after  a  night  of  the  bowl.  So, 
whatever  the  rebater's  moral  obliquity,  or  his 
disregard  of  law  or  the  interests  of  his  client, 
he  is  simply  digging  his  own  grave.  It  is 
impossible  for  anyone  to  rebate  in  Life  In- 
surance and  not  hang  himself  in  the  long  run. 

The  rebater  is  not  a  person  to  be  feared 
in  competition  any  more  than  a  burglar  is 
to  be  feared  at  noonday.  He  moves  stealthily 
and  in  the  dark,  and  has  no  chance  with  a 
man  who  works  in  the  open.  His  days  are 
numbered,  just  as  are  the  days  of  every  dis- 
honest man. 

Reflect  upon  the  scope  of  the  dishonesty 
of  a  rebater.  The  poor  drunkard,  who  saps 
his  vitality  by  drink,  in  a  sense  only  injures 
himself.  The  rebater  in  Life  Insurance  in- 
jures himself,  his  competitors,  trails  the 
business  of  Life  Insurance  in  the  mire,  de- 
bauches his  client,  making  him  a  lawbreaker, 
and  jeopardizes  the  validity  of  the  insurance 
he  sells. 

72 


GENERAL  AGENCY  METHODS 

The  taker  of  a  rebate  is  equally  culpable 
with  the  giver,  under  the  moral  law,  and  is  so 
regarded  in  most  states  by  statute.  It  is 
only  in  a  very  exceptional  case  that  an  agent 
cannot  show  a  client  his  moral  and  legal  re- 
sponsibilities in  seeking,  or  accepting  a  re- 
bate, because  the  vast  majority  of  men  want 
to  do  the  right  thing  from  the  standpoint  of 
law  and  moral  standards,  and  they  are  all 
afraid  of  anything  that  clouds  the  title  of 
their  insurance. 

The  departmentizing  of  a  field  organiza- 
tion has  great  possibilities  in  adding  to  the 
growth  and  development  of  the  whole,  and 
each  individual  agent,  by  in  some  measure 
following  the  diagram  shown  in  frontispiece. 
The  executive  needs  a  corps  of  assistants  who 
are  capable  and  alert,  through  whom,  or  with 
whom,  he  directs  and  serves  the  various  de- 
partment heads  and  those  in  the  agency 
proper.  They  all  create  business,  with  re- 
sults to  the  public  and  themselves,  as  shown 
by  diagram. 

The  suggestion  in  regard  to  departments 

73 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

is,  of  course,  too  comprehensive  for  small 
organizations,  but  is  a  goal  toward  which 
all  should  work.  An  organization  should  be 
so  departmentized  that  no  class  of  people, 
from  the  common  laborer  to  the  skilled  ar- 
tisan, or  the  humblest  clerk  to  the  general 
manager,  or  leading  professional  men,  will 
be  neglected. 

Department  heads  shoulpl,  of  course,  be 
selected  because  of  their  familiarity,  by  ex- 
perience in  real  life  or  in  insurance  work, 
with  the  class  of  people  toward  whom  their 
activities  are  to  be  directed.  Departmentiz- 
ing  is  comparatively  new  in  agency-building, 
but,  in  service  to  the  public  and  in  training 
of  agents,  is  successful  wherever  tried,  and 
is  sure  to  be  incorporated  more  and  more  with 
each  advancing  year. 


CHAPTER  VII 

SOME  SIDE-LIGHTS  ON  THE  LIFE  INSURANCE 
BUSINESS 

IN  the  United  States,  where  Life  Insur- 
ance has  attained  its  greatest  growth  and 
usefulness,  the  business  is  comparatively  new. 
The  first  regular  company  was  incorporated 
in  1835,  but  no  real  business  was  transacted 
by  any  company  until  1843.  While  most  of 
the  older  and  larger  companies  now  doing 
business  in  the  country  were  organized  in  the 
next  twenty  years,  the  real  growth  has  been 
in  the  last  half-century. 

The  slow  growth  at  the  start  was  due  to 
lack  of  public  trust  and  understanding,  and 
unscientific  methods  in  field  work,  together 
with  conditions  in,  and  following  the  panics 
of,  1870  and  1893. 

There  was,  as  well,  internal,  company 
weaknesses — not  in  any  sense  due  to  the  lack 

of  stability  of  Legal  Reserve  Life  Insurance 

75 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

— most  of  which  are  now  eradicated,  and  the 
nature  and  causes  of  which  it  is  not  the  pur- 
pose or  province  of  this  book  to  discuss. 

During  the  last  generation,  especially  the 
latter  half  thereof,  Life  Insurance  has  taken 
its  true  place  in  the  sun  of  business  affairs. 

In  several  instances,  Life  Insurance  has 
been  referred  to  as  the  conservation  of  human 
life.  In  this  regard,  it  has  not  been  properly 
presented  to  the  public  until  more  recent 
years. 

The  conservation  of  human  life  is  a  con- 
servation problem  of  great  magnitude,  and 
Life  Insurance  is  the  most  important  angle 
of  life  conservation.  It  should  be  borne  in 
mind  that  an  individual  is,  in  reality,  only 
a  human  machine,  and  a  frail  one  at  that, 
and  as  such  has  a  definite,  but  perishable 
value  which  must  be  insured  against  loss  by 
death  or  wearing  out  in  old  age. 

A  better  visualization  in  the  minds  of  the 
public  and  its  representatives,  is  not  alone 
responsible  for  the  greater  growth  and  de- 
velopment in  the  United  States.  This  is 

76 


SIDE-LIGHTS  ON  LIFE  INSURANCE 

proven  by  the  fact  that  in  Canada,  where, 
on  a  smaller  scale,  business,  in  geographic 
extent  and  in  other  ways,  is  conducted  more 
as  it  is  in  this  country,  one  finds  Life  Insur- 
ance developing  proportionately  as  on  this 
side  of  the  border. 

The  United  States  is  made  up  very  largely 
of  a  free-thinking,  individualistic  class.  Both 
here  and  in  Canada,  the  greatly  extended 
territorial  conditions  and  enormous  resources, 
with  the  resultant  development  and  multi- 
plication of  fortunes  and  business  enterprises, 
and  necessary  credits  and  hazards,  naturally 
demand  more  Life  Insurance  than  in  older 
and  more  compact  countries.  The  virility 
of  the  two  classes  of  people  carrying  for- 
ward any  worthy  enterprise  is  no  small  fac- 
tor, but  the  reasons  are  fundamental  and  not 
superficial. 

It  will  be  interesting,  therefore,  to  note 
if  there  is  not  an  increase  in  the  sale  of  Life 
Insurance  following  the  present  war,  in  re- 
habilitating and  business-building  in  those 
countries  engaged  in  the  conflict. 

77 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

The  building  of  a  Life  Insurance  com- 
pany, or  the  great  fabric  of  Life  Insurance, 
as  exemplified  in  many  standard  companies, 
is  an  interesting  study.  With  a  large  army 
of  agents  gathering  clients  and  premiums 
from  every  city,  hamlet  and  countryside, 
there  are  created  small  rivulets,  streams  and 
rivers  of  liquid  capital,  flowing  into  a  mighty 
ocean  of  never-evaporating  funds,  which  are 
re-distributed  whenever  and  wherever  most 
needed. 

Even  in  times  of  extreme  panic,  when 
other  financial  institutions  have  been  com- 
pelled to  lie  down,  Life  Insurance  assets  have 
remained  liquidable.  Some  of  the  small  rivu- 
lets ceased  to  exist,  because  of  the  financial 
drought,  but  the  big  streams  and  rivers  never 
ceased  to  flow. 

The  writing  of  what  is  commonly  called 
"  Business  Life  Insurance  "  has  reached  the 
stage  of  an  established  practice  in  the  last 
decade.  This  means  the  insuring  of  the 
active  one,  or  ones,  in  a  business — those  who 
exercise  the  driving  power  and  give  a  busi- 

78 


SIDE-LIGHTS  ON  LIFE  INSURANCE 

ness  its  vital  forces— the  policies  being  pay- 
able to  the  concern,  which  pays  the  premiums. 

A  policy  of  this  nature,  which  matures  by 
the  death  of  the  insured,  or  on  his  attaining 
a  certain  age,  is  a  valuable  asset  in  business 
because  the  money  paid  into  the  business,  in 
either  case,  represents  a  transfer  of  invest- 
ment capital  to  commercial  funds — a  healthy 
transaction  for  a  business.  Moreover,  the 
money  may  come  in  time  of  financial  stress 
when  most  needed. 

Business  men,  large  and  small,  all  over  the 
United  States,  are  being  attracted  to  the 
advantages  of  this  modern  practice,  which 
is  sound  from  every  standpoint.  It  is  a  sub- 
ject which  can  only  be  adequately  treated  in 
an  entire  book. 

Life  Insurance,  in  addition  to  the  modern 
practice  just  outlined,  is  constantly  meeting 
the  needs  of  the  public  in  giving  more  elastic 
benefits  in  the  way  of  income  or  instalment 
policies,  to  cover  the  requirements  of  both 
beneficiaries  and  insured. 

Beyond  this,  insurance  people  are  rapidly 

79 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

awakening  to  the  fact  that  Life  Insurance 
is  the  most  practical  means  whereby  employ- 
ers can  create  a  welfare  fund,  or  indulge 
in  bonus  or  profit-sharing  practices  with  their 
employees  and  their  families,  from  the  day 
laborer  to  the  high-salaried  business  manager. 
It  is  a  boon  alike  to  the  employer,  in  solving 
an  important  problem,  and  to  the  wage 
earner,  in  affording  a  better  life  for  his  fam- 
ily, in  the  event  of  his  death,  or  for  himself 
in  old  age. 

There  is  only  the  attempt,  in  this  chap- 
ter, to  give  a  few  salient  points  in  regard  to 
a  business  which  could  only  be  adequately 
covered  in  a  work  as  large  as  the  Encyclo- 
paedia Britannica.  Agents  over  the  United 
States,  in  recent  years,  have  adopted  the  slo- 
gan, emblazoned  on  a  button  carried  quite 
generally  in  the  lapel  of  the  coat,  "The 
Greatest  Thing  in  the  World."  Undoubt- 
edly, in  its  amelioration  of  mankind,  in  the 
gathering  of  funds,  as  herein  outlined,  and  in 
the  method  of  re-distribution  of  such  funds, 
Life  Insurance  is  the  greatest  business  insti- 
tution known  to  mankind. 

80 


SIDE-LIGHTS  ON  LIFE  INSURANCE 

It  seems  quite  unusual,  even  though  there 
has  been  some  blindness  on  the  part  of  Life 
Insurance  representatives  themselves,  at  the 
home  office  and  in  the  field,  that  there  should 
still  be  so  much  public  ignorance  and  antag- 
onism toward  Life  Insurance. 

With  the  absence  of  Federal  control,  which 
should  be  the  prevailing  system  in  the  regu- 
lation and  organization  of  companies,  the 
multiplicity  of  state  laws  results  in  great 
handicaps  and  annoyances  to  companies  and 
much  additional  expense  to  policyholders.  In 
no  other  single  business  is  there  so  great  and 
legitimate  community  of  interest  of  seller, 
buyer  and  state. 

Much  has  been  accomplished  by  insurance 
interests  coming  together  in  a  clean,  whole- 
some combination  for  educating  the  public, 
and  in  the  correction  and  solving  of  prob- 
lems common  to  all.  There  is  still  a  much 
greater  work  to  be  done  along  this  line.  The 
people,  on  the  other  hand,  only  make  it  the 
harder  for  the  insurance  interests,  and  the 
more  expensive  for  themselves,  by  remain- 

6  81 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

ing  in  an  attitude  of  antagonism,  or  passive 
co-operation,  in  permitting  excessive  taxa- 
tion laws  and  other  unreasonable  statutes, 
not  conforming  to  standard  provisions,  to  be 
enacted  or  remain  upon  the  statute  books. 

The  people,  more  than  the  companies  or 
agents,  are  interested  in  the  elimination  of 
unnecessary  taxation  laws.  They  should  co- 
operate in  securing  sane  laws  to  prevent  the 
organization  of  spurious  companies,  so  many 
of  which  are  allowed,  through  lax  laws  and 
easy-going  supervision,  to  prey  upon  the 
public. 

The  people  are  vitally  interested  in  hav- 
ing each  state  pass  an  agency  qualification 
law,  requiring  an  examination  on  the  funda- 
mentals of  Life  Insurance  before  licensing 
agents. 

Life  Insurance  is  protection  for  benefici- 
aries and  the  old  age  of  the  insured.  Policies 
should  not  be  sold  or  mortgaged.  The  people 
should  recognize  that  their  interests  suffer 
by  not  keeping  policies  in  force,  and  should 
co-operate  with  agents  to  reduce  the  large 

82 


SIDE-LIGHTS  ON  LIFE  INSURANCE 

ratio  of  lapses.  Reducing  the  number  of 
policies  that  are  sold  for  cash,  or  mortgaged, 
means  more  protection  and  cheaper  insur- 
ance for  the  policyholders. 

Life  Insurance  is  most  important  to  all 
classes  of  people  because  it  permits  them, 
under  a  safe  and  practical  plan  of  co-opera- 
tion, through  money  earned  from  the  sweat 
of  their  own  brows,  to  indemnify  themselves 
against  the  known  and  unknown  hazards  in- 
cident to  death  and  old  age,  thus  allowing 
them  to  be  independent  of  any  charitable  or 
paternalistic  institution. 

Mention  has  been  made  of  the  fact  that 
Life  Insurance  is  an  under-done,  rather  than 
over-done,  business,  as  some  are  prone  to 
think.  There  are  ample  statistics  and  figures 
to  prove  the  assertion  that  the  business  is 
only  in  its  infancy,  and  that  the  amount  of 
protection  actually  carried  by  the  people  is 
totally  inadequate,  but  the  decision  of  the 
author  to  abstain  from  the  use  of  figures  and 
dry  statistics  will  not  be  broken  down  here. 

However,    some  very  easily  understood 

83 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

comparisons  will  serve  the  reader's  purpose. 
The  total  amount  of  sound  Life  Insurance 
carried  in  the  United  States  does  not  reach  a 
grand  total  of  twice  the  value  of  the  agri- 
cultural output  of  the  year  1916.  If  all 
policies  in  force  fell  due  at  this  date,  January, 
1917,  the  total  amount  paid  to  policyholders 
would  not  pay  the  wages  of  all  classes  for  the 
year  1917. 

The  total  assets  of  all  companies,  at  the 
close  of  1916,  are  about  equal  to  the  value 
of  the  animal  production  of  the  country 
during  1916.  The  total  assets,  at  the  close 
of  1916,  are  less  than  the  value  of  manufac- 
tured products  of  the  year,  after  deducting 
the  cost  of  production.  The  amount  paid  to 
policyholders  for  the  same  year  is  not  far  in 
advance  of  the  value  of  the  potato  crop,  and 
the  hay  crop  for  1916  will  have  a  total  worth 
of  nearly  twice  the  amount  paid  to  policy- 
holders. 

When  it  is  reflected  that  a  wage  earner 
should  carry  an  amount  of  Life  Insurance 
representing,  to  a  fair  degree,  his  present 

84 


SIDE-LIGHTS  ON  LIFE  INSURANCE 

worth,  the  pronouncement  here  made,  as  to 
the  inadequacy  of  protection  carried,  is  easily 
shown  to  be  in  accordance  with  fact,  not- 
withstanding that  a  consultation  of  the 
records  will  show  figures  difficult  for  the 
ordinary  mind  to  grasp. 

However,  the  United  States  is  a  wealthy 
nation,  grown  to  the  billion  dollar  figures, 
with  incomes  considered  now  as  meagre  which 
a  generation,  or  indeed  a  decade,  ago  were 
thought  ample  or  even  fabulous. 

At  any  rate,  the  amount  of  sound  Life  In- 
surance carried  is  only  a  small  percentage  of 
what  the  whole  should  be,  and  is  inadequate, 
considering  the  property  value  of  the  insur- 
able  lives. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

DOES  IT  PAY  TO  ADVERTISE? 

IT  is  the  purpose  of  this  book  to  deal  with 
the  development  of  a  Life  Insurance  agent 
in  his  individual  capacity. 

In  discussing  the  subject  of  advertising, 
what  constitutes  advertising  and  the  evolu- 
tion of  advertising  for  the  individual  should 
be  the  lines  followed. 

The  first  step  in  advertising,  for  a  Life 
Insurance  agent,  is  the  establishment  of  a 
well-ordered  plan  of  publicity  through  his 
own  personality,  in  gaining  the  favor  of  those 
with  whom  he  comes  in  contact. 

Word  of  mouth  and  shoe  leather  are  con- 
veyances for  the  beginner.  This  does  not 
mean  walking  about  in  an  aimless  way  and 
acquiring  the  reputation  of  being  loquacious. 
It  has  been  pointed  out,  in  a  previous  chap- 
ter, that  an  agent  should  know  when  to  talk 
and  when  not  to  talk. 

86 


DOES  IT  PAY  TO  ADVERTISE? 

However,  the  new  recruit  must  indulge 
in  a  liberal  amount  of  shoe  leather,  and  in- 
terview a  large  number  of  people  in  such 
manner  as  will  draw  those  interviewed  to  him, 
and  compel  them  to  be  interested  in  him,  and 
the  thing  he  is  doing. 

It  is  hard  to  decide  where  to  start  and 
where  to  stop  in  the  matter  of  personal  ad- 
vertising or  publicity  through  the  personal 
equation,  in  connection  with  attending  social 
functions  and  joining  clubs  and  societies. 

It  is  a  matter  of  common  knowledge  that 
many  agents  depress  their  worth  by  over- 
doing both  the  social  and  club  side.  It  is  a 
safe  rule  to  follow  that  where  one  would  not 
otherwise  be  welcome,  it  i&  folly  to  seek 
admittance  for  business  motives. 

It  is  almost  equally  hazardous,  among 
natural  associations  and  affiliations,  to  push 
one's  business,  in  any  calling,  and  made  the 
more  risky  in  the  Life  Insurance  business 
because  of  the  actual  prejudice  or  aloofness 
towards  its  representatives. 

Therefore,  the  Life  Insurance  agent  has 

87 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

a  natural  handicap  which  can  only  be  over- 
come by  a  superior,  or  more  subtle,  method 
of  approach. 

The  law  of  compensation,  however,  which 
is  undoubtedly  very  just  in  all  things,  works 
in  all  lives  to  the  advantage  of  the  individual 
who  recognizes  this  condition,  and  properly 
deports  himself  when  engaged  in  actual 
work,  or  in  meeting  with  people  socially. 

The  things  that  a  man  does  when  at  busi- 
ness, during  business  hours,  are  far  more  im- 
portant in  business-building  than  those  he 
may  do,  or  attempt  to  do,  outside  of  busi- 
ness. It  is  the  intention  to  convey  the  idea 
that  an  agent,  by  active,  earnest  endeavor, 
should  put  himself  in  the  very  best  relation 
with  those  with  whom  he  comes  in  contact, 
at  all  times,  but  more  especially  in  a  busi- 
ness way,  during  the  business  day. 

Any  advantage  to  accrue  from  the  social 
side  should,  and  must,  of  necessity,  be  some- 
thing acquired  as  a  result  of  a  slow  growth 
and  development,  by  never  intruding  beyond 
natural  limitations  and  because  of  a  gradual 

88 


DOES  IT  PAY  TO  ADVERTISE? 

realization,  on  the  part  of  those  with  whom 
he  comes  in  contact,  that  he  has  the  good 
sense  and  breeding  to  leave  his  business  for 
discussion  at  opportune  times  and  fitting 
places. 

Acquaintanceship  through  social  contact  is 
not  valuable  unless  allowed  to  take  ample 
time  for  measuring  one's  worth  and  ability. 

Furthermore,  as  an  individual  advances  in 
his  life's  work,  there  comes  a  realization  that 
it  is  far  more  satisfactory  to  be  entirely  inde- 
pendent socially,  and  to  seek  only  those  asso- 
ciations that  are  congenial,  thus  avoiding  the 
expense  and  weariness  of  exacting  social 
duties. 

However,  the  important  thing  is  that  the 
agent,  in  his  initial  work,  must,  through  the 
personal  equation,  accomplish  the  first  step 
in  advertising  by  getting  in  the  right  rela- 
tion with  his  immediate  public.  When  this 
situation  has  been  established,  and  a  consecu- 
tive, paying  business  realized,  the  use  of 
printers'  ink  should  be  started. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  enlarge  upon  the 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

value  of  the  rightful  use  of  printers'  ink 
in  advertising.  The  judicious,  scientific  use 
of  printers'  ink  is  the  best  known  means  of 
business-building,  and  as  such  is  used  by  in- 
dividuals, corporations,  and  even  nations, 
practically  everywhere  on  the  civilized  globe. 

The  business  of  advertising  has  become  a 
wonderful  institution  in  the  United  States, 
and  has  become,  through  its  representatives, 
a  potent  factor  in  the  growth  and  economy  of 
marketing  various  commodities. 

In  addition  to  the  foregoing,  it  has  played 
an  important  part  in  standardization  and  a 
resultant  elimination  of  fraud  and  deceit  in 
business. 

A  partial  step  has  been  made,  with  very 
satisfactory  results,  by  agents  combining  in 
a  non-partisan  or  institutional  advertising 
campaign,  to  educate  the  public  on  the  prin- 
ciples and  practices  of  Life  Insurance. 

Wherever  this  has  been  introduced,  the 
agents  have  found  that  they  were  working 
in  a  better  prepared  field,  in  their  individual 
solicitation  and  in  their  own  publicity  cam- 
paigns. 

90 


DOES  IT  PAY  TO  ADVERTISE? 

Undoubtedly  the  time  will  come  when  all 
standard  companies  and  agents  will  combine, 
under  some  master-institutional  campaign  in 
the  use  of  printers'  ink,  because  such  action 
is  sure  to  create  a  more  intelligent  public 
opinion  and  eliminate  waste  problems  com- 
mon to  all  companies.  It  will  bring  about 
a  more  desirable  community  of  interest  be- 
tween those  three  important  factors  to  all 
world  problems — the  State,  the  Public  and 
the  Institution. 

Predicated  upon  experience,  the  absolute 
assertion  can  be  made  that  it  does  pay  for 
the  agent  to  advertise — through  the  personal 
equation;  then  as  an  individual  agent,  by 
the  use  of  printers'  ink ;  or  as  a  manager,  in 
a  broader  way ;  and,  finally,  under  some  col- 
lective or  co-operative  plan  with  competing 
companies  or  agents — but,  it  must  be  remem- 
bered, in  any  campaign  of  advertising,  one 
must  learn  to  walk  before  trying  to  run,  and 
it  is  necessary  to  have  ammunition  and  range 
before  firing  a  gun  of  large  calibre. 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE  WOMAN  IN  LIFE  INSURANCE 

IT  is  useless  to  theorize  and  sentimentalize 
in  raising  objections  to  women  in  business, 
and  in  their  taking  a  place  wherever  in  the 
world's  work  their  desires  or  necessities  may 
lead  them.  This  does  not  mean  that  it  should 
not  tear  men's  heartstrings  and  give  them 
a  feeling  of  shame  to  see,  in  the  early  hours 
of  morning  and  the  late  ones  of  night,  women 
and  girls,  careworn  and  haggard,  jostling 
with  men  for  place  or  seats — all  too  fre- 
quently standing  room — in  a  street  car  going 
to  and  from  the  hardships  of  active  business 
life. 

Two  classes  of  men  are  responsible  for 
women  now  bearing  the  relation  to  business 
and  public  affairs  expressed  in  the  opening 
sentences  of  this  chapter.  The  selfish  ones 
who  never  look  after  anyone  but  themselves, 
and  who  literally  drive  women  to  work  be- 

92 


WOMAN  IN  LIFE  INSURANCE 

cause  of  their  brutal  habits  or  disposition; 
and  the  ones  who,  from  complacency  or  in- 
capacity, fail  to  supply  adequate  support 
and  protection.  Usually,  wherever  unkind 
statements  are  heard  about  "  skirts  "  in  busi- 
ness, they  will  be  found  to  emanate  from 
one  of  these  classes  of  men. 

Hard  and  irreconcilable  as  it  is  to  con- 
template a  woman's  canvassing,  she  never- 
theless has  a  place  in  the  field,  and  women 
agents  are  increasing  at  present  with  a 
considerable  degree  of  rapidity.  Compara- 
tively few  canvass  men,  but  some  do  almost 
entirely,  and  with  creditable  success. 

Without  comment  as  to  the  present,  or 
predictions  for  the  future,  it  is  sufficient  to 
leave  this  phase  of  the  question  to  the  ca- 
pabilities and  inclinations  of  the  individual 
woman  who  engages  in  the  work. 

Women  have  a  real  place  as  Life  Insur- 
ance agents  in  writing  policies  for  their  own 
sex.  The  insuring  of  women  of  all  classes 
and  conditions  is  a  very  necessary  part  of 
the  Life  Insurance  business,  and  is  made 

93 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

more  practical  by  the  work  of  women  agents. 

It  is  superfluous  to  enumerate  the  classes 
of  women  that  should  insure,  because  it  is 
just  as  necessary  and  practical  for  all  those 
who  are  engaged  in  gainful  occupations, 
financial  women  or  wage  earners  from  the 
highest  to  the  lowest,  to  insure  as  it  is  for 
men  of  every  class.  It  is  not  so  much  of 
an  axiom  that  housewives  should  insure,  with- 
out more  careful  analysis. 

Among  the  great  rank  and  file,  it  is  crim- 
inal for  men  not  to  be  adequately  insured, 
and  almost  as  bad  for  the  women  not  to 
carry  Life  Insurance  protection  also.  Even 
rich  married  women  should  take  insurance 
as  a  means  of  better  directing  the  future 
care  of  their  loved  ones,  or  the  disposition 
of  their  estates. 

The  wife  is  a  partner  in  every  household, 
with  responsibilities  resting  upon  her  shoul- 
ders just  as  great,  and  often  greater  than 
those  carried  by  the  husband.  The  loss,  by 
death,  of  her  property  value  and  tender  su- 
pervision, has  meant  disruption  and  result- 

94 


WOMAN  IN  LIFE  INSURANCE 

ant  pauperism  and  suffering  in  countless 
homes.  In  all  such  cases,  had  Life  Insur- 
ance protection  been  carried,  the  evils  result- 
ing from  the  death  of  the  home  keeper  would 
have  been  greatly  minimized. 

There  are  several  women's  departments  of 
large  agencies,  and  a  few  agencies  employ- 
ing only  women  agents,  and  writing  women 
risks  exclusively,  that  are  making  marked 
successes.  There  is  ample  proof  and  experi- 
ence to  back  the  evidence  that  the  insuring 
of  women  by  women  is  a  business  of  large 
proportions  considered  in  its  national  aspect. 

No  special  rules  are  applicable  to  this  large 
branch  of  the  business  of  Life  Insurance. 
The  same  rules  of  conduct,  methods  and  effi- 
ciency measures  apply  as  in  the  case  of  the 
regular  agents.  It  is  a  great  work,  to  be 
conducted  in  the  ordinary  practical  ways.  It 
offers  splendid  opportunity  as  a  means  of 
livelihood  for  women  who  will  undertake  the 
work  along  lines  suggested  in  the  chapters 
of  this  book,  with  the  aid  of  other  material 
and  training,  of  which  there  is  an  abundance 

95 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

for  all  purposes.  A  woman,  just  as  a  man, 
should  weigh  all  the  pros  and  cons  before 
going  into  the  work,  and  then  go  in  to  stay. 

It  is  probably  true  that  women  are  nat- 
urally, because  of  their  domestic  leanings, 
more  gifted  than  men  in  the  matter  of  de- 
tail. For  this  reason,  the  opportunity  is 
great  for  women  in  office  work  in  the  Life 
Insurance  business.  It  is  a  business  of  in- 
finite detail.  In  conducting  the  affairs  of 
agencies,  much  opportunity  is  afforded  to 
increase  business  and  enhance  service  to 
policyholders  by  more  prompt,  thorough  and 
courteous  handling  of  detail. 

The  work  of  women,  in  the  capacities  of 
assistants,  secretaries,  clerks,  stenographers 
and  cashiers  in  offices,  is  playing  an  impor- 
tant part  in  improved  conditions.  This  does 
not  mean  that  a  man  should  not  be  efficient 
in  detail  or  feel  an  aloofness  toward  it,  and 
many  lose  the  chance  for  bigger  things  be- 
cause they  are  not  good  soldiers  in  the  smaller 
ones.  Everyone  in  the  office  should  be  alert 
for  new  business,  and  in  taking  best  care  of 

the  old. 

96 


WOMAN  IN  LIFE  INSURANCE 

It  is  not  the  intention  to  picture  women 
as  mere  machines  in  office  work  or  business 
management.  Some  of  the  most  conspicu- 
ous successes  in  business  life  are  made  not 
alone  with  the  help,  advice  and  co-operation 
of  a  good  woman  in  the  home,  but  with  the 
aid  and  co-operation  of  a  woman  who  is  an 
associate  in  business.  Many  such  exercise 
executive  ability  and  intuitive  judgment  of 
the  very  highest  order,  and  make  for  them- 
selves places  of  great  value.  This  is  true 
in  every  line  of  business,  and  especially  so 
in  Life  Insurance. 

Woman's  intuitive  knowledge  or  judg- 
ment is  undoubtedly  better  than  man's.  It 
is  particularly  valuable  for  a  woman,  if  she 
can  go  into  business  life  and  assume  respon- 
sibilities and  still  retain  her  womanly  qual- 
ities and  graciousness  of  manner.  The  more 
she  is  able  to  do  this,  the  higher  she  will 
rise  in  her  executive  or  secretarial  capacities. 

Genteel  consideration  for  others  in  busi- 
ness is  a  much  neglected  fundamental;  one 
of  the  great  moral  fibres  to  be  injected  into 

7  97 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

business  is  more  of  the  niceties  of  life.  Too 
many  men  and  women,  especially  the  former, 
have  one  set  of  ethics  for  the  drawing-room 
and  ball-room  and  another  for  business  life. 
This  country  needs  to  speed  up  on  good  man- 
ners, not  just  because  there  are  so  many 
women  engaged  in  active  affairs,  which  is  a 
sufficient  reason  of  itself,  but  because  it  is 
good  business. 

As  pointed  out  in  the  opening  of  this  chap- 
ter, the  advent  of  woman  in  business  is  a 
reality.  She  should,  and  does,  have  a  place 
for  her  activities  in  Life  Insurance,  covering 
a  wide  range  of  duties  and  accomplishments, 
and  those  who  are  disposed  to  labor  seriously 
and  efficiently  should  be,  and  are,  welcome 
in  the  work. 


CHAPTER  X 

RECAPITULATION 

IN  summing  up  the  chapters  of  this  book, 
the  sequential  order  in  which  the  material 
has  been  given  will  not  be  followed.  In  fact, 
so  far  as  the  first  six  chapters  are  concerned, 
the  order  will  be  exactly  reversed. 

In  the  arrangement  of  chapters,  the  idea 
was  to  build  from  opportunity  to  company, 
or  from  the  outside  to  the  inside,  whereas, 
in  the  recapitulation,  the  company  is  taken 
as  the  fountain-head,  which  is  in  accord  with 
the  facts,  building  out  to  the  opportunity. 

The  unsophisticated  reader  should  not  be 
misled  by  any  criticism  which  has  been  made, 
and  his  rightful,  wholesome  respect  for  the 
scientific  accuracy  of  Legal  Reserve  Life 
Insurance,  and  its  fundamental  stability, 
should  not  be  weakened. 

Neither  should  any  suggestions  as  to  what 
might  have  been  in  building  work,  or  reforms 

that  can  be  inaugurated  in  the  future,  be 

99, 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

construed  as  carping  criticism  or  antagonis- 
tic reflections  upon  home  office  management. 

The  purpose  of  this  book  is  constructive, 
not  destructive,  and  any  criticism  and  all  as- 
sertions, pro  and  con,  which  have  been,  or 
will  be,  made  are  dominated  by  an  abiding 
conviction  that  only  good  can  accrue  in  tell- 
ing the  truth,  where  so  much  praise  is  due, 
and  where  faults,  so  superficial  in  kind,  can 
be  easily  eradicated  if  held  up  to  the  search- 
light of  public  opinion. 

The  facts  are  that  the  chief  exponents  of 
the  Legal  Reserve  system  of  Life  Insurance 
in  the  United  States  and  Canada  present  a 
record  for  accomplishment,  at  the  home  office 
and  in  the  field,  which  compares  very  favor- 
ably with,  if  not  excels,  that  of  any  set  of 
corporations  in  the  history  of  organized  busi- 
ness-building. 

The  proportion  of  broad  minded,  big 
minded,  high  minded  individuals  dominating 
home  office  policies,  constitutes  both  a  tribute 
to  the  institution  of  Life  Insurance  and  the 

manhood  of  the  two  peoples. 

100 


RECAPITULATION 

Even  to  the  uninitiated  reader,  it  must 
be  palpable  that  Life  Insurance  is  a  great 
equalizing  force,  and  in  principles  and  prac- 
tices thoroughly  ingrained  in  the  body-politic 
of  this  country. 

It  is  well  said  that  Life  Insurance  is  or- 
ganized thrift.  Characterizing  the  business 
in  this  manner  is  not  putting  it  in  opposition 
to  other  saving  or  fiduciary  institutions.  The 
purposes  of  Life  Insurance  and  every  other 
fiscal  institution,  from  the  Federal  Reserve 
Bank  to  the  smallest  cross-roads  bank,  are 
identical.  The  more  of  all  such  concerns  that 
serve  the  people  with  intelligence  and  in- 
tegrity, the  better  for  the  people  and  the 
country. 

Life  Insurance,  in  its  dual  capacity  of  pro- 
tection and  organized  thrift,  embraces  func- 
tions of  service  enjoyed  by  no  other  insti- 
tution. 

Then,  it  should  be  borne  in  mind  that  an 
individual  business,  or  principle,  can  have  all 
kinds  of  merit,  and  still  exert  very  moderate 
influence,  or  none  at  all,  without  organiza- 
tion, co-ordination  and  push  behind  it. 
101 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

Life  Insurance  companies  are  permitted 
to  indulge  in  an  educative  campaign,  collec- 
tively and  separately,  through  the  medium  of 
advertising,  and  field  organizations  and  indi- 
vidual agents  can  do  the  same  thing  down  to 
that  best  and  most  scientific  of  all  publicity, 
the  individual  equation,  by  personal  contact 
of  the  single  agent  in  his  daily  work. 

So  we  find  field  organizations  endeavoring 
to  select  standardized  representatives  who 
will  work  with  system  and  efficiency — men 
who  are,  or  should  be,  exercising  an  advanced 
method  of  salesmanship,  and  who  have  not 
just  "  happened  "  in  the  business,  but  who 
carefully  selected  it  as  their  vocation,  at  the 
right  time,  in  a  rational  manner,  because  they 
saw  the  opportunity  for  service,  growth  and 
development. 

The  more  prominent  organizations,  in 
order  to  carry  the  message  of  Life  Insurance 
to  every  class  of  people,  have  reduced  their 
operations  to  a  statistical  basis,  checking  each 
year's  production,  and  showing  the  number 
written  in  each  classification  here  published: 

102 


RECAPITULATION 


CLASSIFICATION  OF  OCCUPATIONS 

Housewives 

WOMEN 

Salaried 

Business 


(  Protestant    „«..,(  Players 
Clergymen  •<   _,  Al    ..  Theatrical  J  _      J 

|  Catholic  1  Investors 


Educators 

Physicians 

Lawyers 

Insurance 

Dentists 

Osteopaths 

Railroads 

Grain 

Flour 

Lumber 

Farmers 

Wholesale 

Retail 

Capitalists 

Manufacturers 


Public  Officials 

Brokers  and  Bondsmen 

Bankers 

Real  Estate 

Contractors 

Implements 

Automobile 

Engineers 

Miners 

Artisans 

Telegraph 

Telephone 

Minors     • 

Common  laborers 

Miscellaneous 


Systematic  checking  each  year  of  the  work 
of  an  agent  and  entire  organization  with  re- 


103 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

sultant  thoroughness  in  carrying  the  message 
of  life  insurance  to  every  class  in  a  scientific, 
intensive  manner,  means  better  training  of 
agents  and  enhanced  service  to  the  Public. 
It  is  organized  thrift  with  a  vengeance. 

Life  Insurance,  Printers'  Ink  and  Trans- 
portation are  the  great  Public  business  con- 
veyances to  comfort,  enlightenment  and 
progress.  Toward  all  three  of  these,  espe- 
cially Life  Insurance  and  Railroads,  there 
exist  Public  ignorance  and  antagonism  to 
an  unreasonable  degree. 

Publicity,  Education  and  Corrective 
measures  on  the  part  of  Life  Insurance,  with 
open  minded  interest  on  the  part  of  the  Pub- 
lic, will  have  a  wholesome  effect  on  existing 
conditions.  Insurance  interests  are  moving 
up  grade  in  broader,  saner,  more  efficient 
and  economical  conduct  of  the  business.  It 
is  up  to  the  people,  especially  the  younger 
generation,  to  do  their  part  in  a  thorough, 
open-minded  consideration  of  a  subject  of 
such  vast  importance  in  its  general  aspect 
and  as  a  vocation.  Only  intellectual  con- 

104 


RECAPITULATION 

tempt  should  be  accorded  one  who  in  a  seri- 
ous mood  speaks  lightly  of  sound  Life 
Insurance. 

Finally,  the  attempt  has  been  made  to  give 
a  human  interest  flash-light  of  Life  Insur- 
ance as  a  principle;  to  dress  Company  offi- 
cials, and  especially  agents,  in  a  more  attrac- 
tive garb,  and  at  the  same  time  show  real 
development  possible  for  the  agent  and  what 
that  means  to  the  Public.  That  there  is  great 
opportunity  for  business-building  and  ad- 
vancement for  the  ones  who  will  respond  to 
the  things  of  conscience  and  efficiency 
training. 

The  author  cannot  refrain,  after  the  labor- 
ious but  pleasant  hours  spent  in  writing  this 
vocational  treatise,  from  indulging  in  a  part- 
ing word  to  those  worthy  readers  who  have 
persevered  to  the  end. 

The  nature  of  a  person's  vocation  is  not 
the  all-important  thing;  it  is  what  one  makes 
of  his  Life  Job  that  counts,  and  that  means 
what  they  put  into  it  and  take  out  of  it. 

The  efficient  life  is  too  commonly  regarded 

105 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

as  necessary  work,  and  mere  money  getting 
instead  of  a  pleasurable  pastime  in  rising  to 
a  higher  level.  The  person  who  does  any- 
thing, no  matter  how  humble  or  exalted  the 
job,  is  a  poor  equation  in  the  World's  work 
unless  he  sees  in  daily  toil  something  beyond 
the  immediate  crust  or  bag  of  gold. 

Success  is  not  just  eating  three  meals  a 
day,  paying  one's  debts,  joining  a  Church, 
or  amassing  a  fortune.  It  is  so  doing  and 
living  in  beautifying  the  immediate  task,  and 
in  touching  other  souls  and  lives  with  sun- 
shine and  inspired  endeavor,  as  will  make 
them  enlist  in  a  mighty  army  of  sincere,  earn- 
est, capable  workers  for  that  better  day  when 
greed,  squalor  and  cruel  aggrandizement 
shall  have  forever  perished  from  the  earth. 


PART  II 

THE   LIFE   INSURANCE 
AGENT  AND  THE  LAYMAN 


CHAPTER  XI 

THE  AGENT  AND  THE  LAYMAN 

AT  the  time  when  these  words  are  being 
written  there  is  transpiring  the  most  cruel, 
destructive  war  in  the  history  of  the  world. 
It  requires  considerable  optimism  and  pro- 
phetic vision  to  look  forward  to  a  reasonable 
fruition  of  a  sane,  peaceful,  interdependent 
relation  between  nations  and  peoples.  How- 
ever, there  would  be  little  in  life  to  make  it 
worth  living  were  we  to  believe  that  man,  the 
highest  tangible  exemplification  of  the  Crea- 
tor's handiwork,  was  not  moving  to  a  higher 
level  in  things  of  the  heart. 

There  is  a  powerful  undercurrent  of  senti- 
ment and  belief,  not  just  by  impractical 
idealists,  but  in  the  minds  of  stalwarts, 
among  the  laymen  and  those  high  in  public 
life,  that  there  is  an  interdependent  relation 
to  be  carried  to  a  higher  plane  between  indi- 
viduals, businesses  and  individuals,  world 

109 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

movements  and  the  nations  themselves.  It 
is  the  purpose  here  to  emphasize  to  the  lay- 
man and  agent,  as  well,  the  importance  of 
the  business  and  the  responsibilities  resting 
upon  the  shoulders  of  the  laymen,  that  every 
individual  has  a  far-reaching  responsibility 
that  is  both  selfish  and  unselfish. 

Until  recent  years,  as  pointed  out  in  Part 
I,  Life  Insurance  was  commonly  considered 
as  something  apart  from  the  ordinary  busi- 
ness, having  to  do  only  with  death  and  the 
protection  of  the  home.  It  has  now  taken  on 
a  much  wider  significance  and  brought  down 
to  earth  among  the  ordinary  affairs  of  life 
in  the  practice  of  Business  Life  Insurance, 
Welfare  or  Profit  Sharing  Insurance,  and 
in  the  shape  of  various  forms  of  Income 
Policies. 

To  give  the  layman  a  better  "  mind  slant  " 
of  the  practical,  everyday  nature  of  Life 
Insurance,  a  short  review  of  these  three  mod- 
ern interpretations  will  be  given. 


CHAPTER  XII 

BUSINESS  LIFE  INSURANCE 

THE  greatest  by-product  of  all  is  human 
efficiency — the  potentiality  of  individuals  en- 
gendered beyond  the  usual  or  created  where 
there  has  been  little  or  no  earning  power. 
Without  education  for  efficiency,  there  is 
created  an  undue  number  of  ne'er-do-wells, 
paupers,  mendicants,  over-abundance  of 
criminals  and  a  mass  of  individuals  whose 
minimum  instead  of  maximum  accomplish- 
ment is  attained. 

These  things  are  mentioned  because  effi- 
ciency begets  confidence,  confidence  inspires 
credit  and  credit  means  business.  They  all 
develop  the  individual  equation — the  potenti- 
ality of  man  power,  the  greatest  of  all  values. 

It  is  the  importance  of  this  earning  power 
of  the  individual  that  makes  Business  Life 
Insurance  possible  and  practical. 

The  increasing  sentiment  in  favor  of  this 
ill 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

form  of  Life  Insurance  is  due  to  the  logical 
reasons  which  impel  a  business  or  enterprise 
to  -avail  itself  of  this  modern  form  of  indem- 
nity. It  is  perfectly  sane  and  rational  to 
assert  that  the  leading  men  in  control  of  any 
company,  those  who  exercise  the  driving 
power  and  give  a  business  its  vital  forces,  are 
the  most  valuable  asset  of  the  concern.  Indi- 
viduals create  property  and  enhance  its 
value.  No  one  disputes  the  advisability  of 
fire  insurance  for  property.  Therefore,  Life 
Insurance  on  the  individual  payable  to  a 
company  is  more  necessary  than  fire  insur- 
ance for  property.  Fire  may  never  occur, 
death  must  occur. 

A  careful  study  of  the  subject  of  Cor- 
poration or  Business  Life  Insurance  leads 
to  the  conviction  that  the  practice  is  founded 
on  broad,  rational  business  lines. 

First:  Because  it  is  logical  to  place  a 
definite  property  value  upon  a  certain  indi- 
vidual or  collection  of  individuals  in  relation 
to  an  enterprise. 

Second:   Because  the  loss  of  their  prop- 

112 


BUSINESS  LIFE  INSURANCE 

erty  value  by  death  may  occur  at  the  most 
inopportune  time  in  regard  to  financial  con- 
ditions, or  in  relation  to  the  possibility  of 
securing  a  good  substitute. 

Third:  Death  may  occur  while  some  ex- 
tension of  operations  is  under  way  where  the 
one  carrying  them  out  is  almost  wholly  re- 
sponsible for  their  successful  termination. 

Fourth:  It  is  frequently  considered  ad- 
visable to  acquire  the  interest  of  a  deceased 
member  of  a  corporation  or  enterprise. 

Fifth:  In  many  cases  men,  themselves, 
desire  that  their  estates  discontinue  a  finan- 
cial interest  in  their  business  after  death. 

Sixth:  Because  of  the  sinking  fund  fea- 
ture in  an  Endowment  contract  in  the  avail- 
ability of  its  Cash  or  Loan  Values  in  the 
event  of  financial  stress  in  general  or  in  rela- 
tion to  strained  financial  conditions  of  a 
single  concern  in  particular. 

Seventh:  In  the  case  of  a  Bond  issue,  an 

Endowment  policy  can  be  purchased  to  take 

care  of  the  bonds  at  a  certain  period,  or  to 

provide  funds  for  their  retirement  in  the 

8  113 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

event  of  death  of  the  leading  head  before 
maturity  of  the  bonds. 

Eighth :  The  advantage  as  a  credit  propo- 
sition. Every  one  knows  that  credit,  if  an 
enterprise  is  a  going  one,  is  founded  very 
largely  upon  personality.  Banks  and  indi- 
viduals granting  credit  give  the  very  strong- 
est endorsement  of  this  form  of  Life  Insur- 
ance. Bankers  and  money  lenders  want  to 
know  that  there  is  something  coming  into  a 
business  to  offset  the  loss  by  death  of  its 
leading  head  or  heads.  Many  firms  have 
been  forced  into  liquidation  because  of  the 
calling  in  of  their  commercial  paper  on  ac- 
count of  the  lack  of  this  very  thing. 

Ninth:  Because  property  belongs  to  man 
and  not  man  to  property. 

Tenth :  Because  it  conserves  the  property 
value  of  the  individual  to  the  business, 
whether  he  retires  by  death  or  because  of 
age  limit. 

Eleventh:  Because  of  the  effect  on  the 
habits  of  men  carrying  large  policies.  A 
man  will,  as  a  logical  sequence,  take  better 

114 


BUSINESS  LIFE  INSURANCE 

care  of  his  health  and  habits  after  taking 
out  a  very  large  policy. 

Twelfth:  Because  of  the  fact  that  the 
finances  of  our  country  are  divided  into 
investment  and  commercial  funds.  When  a 
death  occurs  calling  for  the  payment  of  a 
large  Business  policy,  there  is  a  permanent 
transfer  of  investment  funds  to  commercial 
funds,  which  is  always  a  healthy  transaction 
for  the  life  of  trade. 

In  addition  to  all  the  foregoing,  it  is 
well  to  have  in  mind  that  a  general  applica- 
tion of  Business  Insurance  is,  in  reality  and 
effect,  the  same  to  a  large  extent  as  the  pur- 
chase of  what  is  commonly  considered  per- 
sonal insurance.  The  time  is  past  when 
any  good  citizen  has  a  desire  to  die  leaving 
his  family  in  comfortable  circumstances 
through  the  medium  of  Life  Insurance  and 
his  creditors  in  the  lurch  because  of  his  un- 
timely death.  Life  Insurance,  payable  to  a 
business,  protects  the  creditor  and,  in  effect, 
results  as  a  protection  to  the  family  because 
of  the  perpetuation  or  proper  sale  of  the 
business. 

115 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

There  is  too  much  of  a  disposition  to  float 
with  the  current  in  the  business  of  Life  In- 
surance. It  is  well  to  guide  and  control  pub- 
lic opinion  when  this  guidance  is  dictated  by 
conscientious  understanding.  The  practice 
of  Business  Life  Insurance  has  been  more 
among  the  larger  concerns.  That  large  busi- 
ness enterprises  are  the  only  logical  patrons 
is  a  grievous  error. 

If  Business  Insurance  is  advisable  and 
necessary  for  the  large,  financially  strong 
concerns,  it  must  of  necessity  be  far  more 
important  to  the  smaller  and  weaker  con- 
cerns whose  management  and  prosperity  are 
more  dependent  upon  one  or  two  individuals. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

WELFARE  INSURANCE 

THE  greatest  factor  in  business  life  is  the 
importance  of  all  working  for  a  wage  keep- 
ing fit  mentally  and  physically  and  connect- 
ing each  working  minute  with  the  main  pur- 
pose of  their  life. 

Crime,  Mental  Defectiveness,  Drug  and 
Liquor  Victims,  Physical  Unfortunates,  In- 
dustrial Incompetents,  Social  Parasites,  all 
are  Welfare  problems,  because  every  one  of 
them  is  the  result  of  poverty,  or  causes 
poverty. 

Astounding  and  incredible  as  it  sounds, 
these  things  are  a  tax  on  this  nation  to  the 
enormous  total  of  over  a  billion  of  dollars 
annually. 

The  present  worth  of  a  billion  dol- 
lars a  year  for  ten  years,  at  4  per  cent.,  is 
$8,556,400,000. 

This  overwhelming  figure,  the  present 
117 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

worth  of  what  we  will  spend  (under  present 
conditions)  in  the  next  decade,  is  largely 
wasted.  This  huge  sum,  for  charities,  public 
and  private,  equals  almost  one  entire  year's 
agricultural  wealth  productivity  of  the 
country. 

It  would  be  interesting  to  cite,  from  the 
meager  national  statistics,  the  number  of 
men,  women  and  children  in  penal  institu- 
tions, almshouses,  asylums,  hospitals,  train- 
ing schools  and  other  institutions  of  kindred 
nature — the  number  of  old  men  and  women, 
widows  and  orphans  working  for  wages, 
enduring  the  hardships  of  the  world's  activ- 
ities, instead  of  enjoying  comfortable  homes. 

It  is  sufficient,  however,  to  draw  attention 
to  the  fact  that  the  number  of  all  these  is 
so  disgracefully  and  alarmingly  large  as  to 
constitute  a  severe  indictment  of  the  citizenry 
of  this  nation. 

This  condition  is  due  to  incompetency, 
inefficiency,  and  lack  of  far-sighted  co-oper- 
ation and  unselfish,  humanitarian  dealing 
upon  the  part  of  both  capital  and  labor, 

118 


WELFARE  INSURANCE 

employer  and  employee ;  the  only  difference 
being  that  the  man  upon  the  hilltop,  with 
more  worldly  goods,  and  supposedly  of 
greater  brain  power,  should — per  se — be  ex- 
pected to  be  the  aggressor  along  construct- 
ive, humanitarian  lines. 

Experience  and  observation  show  conclu- 
sively that  a  horse,  or  even  an  inanimate  ma- 
chine such  as  a  motor  car  or  farm  machinery, 
must  be  in  good  condition  in  order  to  work 
well.  If  the  dumb  beast  and  the  inanimate 
machine  must  be  fit  in  order  to  work  well, 
what  of  the  human  mind  and  mechanism? 

In  other  words,  the  "  mental  slant  "  is  the 
thing  that  is  wrong,  and  it  is  the  thing  which 
must  be  corrected  if  any  reasonable  fruition 
of  welfare  problems  is  to  be  realized. 

Mr.  James  Couzens  said  in  a  recent  article 
in  the  World's  Work,  "It  is  not  charity 
that  is  needed  to  make  self-supporting  and 
self-respecting  citizens:  It  is  work,  and  a 
living  wage." 

There  is  no  attempt  to  preach  the  doctrine 
of  supreme  accomplishment  in  the  elimina- 

119 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

tion  of  welfare  problems,  but  there  is  the 
contention  that,  outside  of  the  really  men- 
tally and  physically  defective,  there  is  an 
alarming  condition,  and  a  widespread  need 
for  efficient,  constructive  effort  and  humani- 
tarian policies. 

Gerald  Stanley  Lee,  in  Crowds,  voices 
these  sentiments: 

6  What  really  counts,  and  what  finally  de- 
cides what  men  and  women  shall  be,  what 
really  gets  their  attention,  unfathomably, 
unconsciously,  is  the  way  they  earn  their 
money.  The  feeling  men  come  to  have  about 
a  fact,  of  its  being  what  it  is,  helplessly, 
whether  or  no — the  feeling  that  they  come  to 
have  about  something,  of  its  being  immemo- 
rially  and  innumerably  the  same  everywhere 
and  forever,  comes  from  what  they  are  think- 
ing and  the  way  they  think  while  they  are 
earning  their  money.  It  is  out  of  the  sub- 
conscious and  the  monotonous  that  all  our 
little  heavens  and  hells  are  made.  It  is  our 
daily  work  that  becomes  to  us  the  real  floor 

and  roof  of  living,  hugs  up  under  us  like 
120 


WELFARE  INSURANCE 

the  ground,  fits  itself  down  over  us,  and  is 
our  earth  and  sky.  The  man  with  whom 
we  earn  our  money,  the  man  who  employs 
us,  his  thinking  or  not  thinking,  his  '  I  will ' 
and  '  I  will  not,'  are  the  iron  boundaries  of 
the  world  to  us.  He  is  the  skylight  and  the 
manhole  of  life." 

Also, 

"  One  sees  these  men  everywhere  one  goes, 
in  thousands  of  factories,  doing  their  work 
without  any  draught — we  already  have  tall 
chimneys  for  our  coal  furnaces ;  we  have  next 
to  see  the  value  of  tall  chimneys,  great  flues 
to  the  sky,  on  the  lives  and  thought  and  inner 
energies  of  men. 

1  The  most  obvious  way  to  get  a  draught 
on  a  man — to  get  him  to  glow  up  and  work- 
is  to  cut  through  an  opening  in  the  top  of 
his  life. 

"  Just  where  to  cut  this  opening,  and  just 
how  to  cut  it  in  each  man's  life — each  man 
considered  as  a  problem  by  himself — is  the 

labor  problem." 

121 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

This  is  also  a  welfare  problem  of  great 
magnitude. 

Mr.  Lee  says  further: 

"  If  a  man  is  a  sane  and  sound  man  and 
works  hard,  he  must  feel  that  everything  he 
does,  every  minute,  is  definitely  connected 
with  the  main  through  train  purpose  of 
his  life." 

Ah!    there's  the  rub! 

The  people  over  this  broad  land  are  more 
interested  in  opportunity  for  industrial  free- 
dom and  the  exercise  of  equal  business  rights 
and  in  earned  reward  through  bonus,  or 
profit-sharing  system  and  old  age  incomes 
from  the  sources  for  which  they  have  labored, 
than  they  are  in  any  paternalistic  plan  on 
the  part  of  the  state  or  through  the  medium 
of  swollen  fortunes.  The  people  of  the 
country,  as  a  whole,  are  anxious,  in  fact,  their 
pride  demands,  that  there  be  a  direct  con- 
nection between  the  sweat  of  their  own  brows 
and  their  support,  including  old  age,  when 
active  employment  must  cease. 

The  population  is  made  up  of  individual- 

122 


WELFARE  INSURANCE 

istic,  free,  thinking  people,  and  paternalism, 
when  once  understood  in  its  full  import,  is 
contrary  to  the  thought  and  traditions  of  the 
nation. 

In  thinking  of  social  insurance,  or  pater- 
nalism of  any  form,  in  Life  Insurance  there 
is  immediately  visualized  the  idea  of  a  tri- 
angle; the  employee  at  one  angle,  the  em- 
ployer at  another  and  the  government  at  the 
third. 

With  a  law-enforced,  subsidized  insurance, 
the  employee's  efficiency  goes — not  the  direct 
route  along  one  side  of  the  triangle  to  his 
employer — but  around  the  two  other  sides 
through  the  government.  Efficiency  is  rep- 
resented by  the  idea  that  a  straight  line  is 
the  shortest  distance  between  two  points. 

Welfare  Life  (live)  Insurance,  bought 
for  the  family  and  old  age  of  the  insured, 
is  connecting  up  with  the  employee  or  asso- 
ciate along  one  side  of  the  triangle — the 
short  route  and  the  efficient  way. 

Aristotle,  when  asked  what  he  gained  from 
philosophy,  replied,  "  To  do,  without  being 

123 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

commanded,  what  others  do  from  fear  of 
laws." 

It  is  very  fitting  to  draw  attention  to  em- 
ployers of  labor,  and  all  those  who  work  for 
a  wage,  that  the  protective  and  profit-sharing 
features  of  Life  Insurance  purchased  for 
employees  is  not  only  a  better,  more  practi- 
cal method  than  any  law-enforced  plan,  but 
is  philosophically  and  psychologically  sound 
in  doing  something  for  employees  in  advance 
of  a  law-enforced  method,  which  is  sure  to 
come,  at  least  under  present  conditions. 

To-day,  we  are  assuming  that  there  is  too 
much  crime,  too  much  tuberculosis,  too  many 
people  incapacitated  by  other  diseases,  too 
many  mental  incompetents.  That  there  are 
too  many  old  men  and  women — too  many 
children,  too  many  widows,  enduring  the 
hardships  of  earning  a  bare  living,  and  that 
these  things  are  largely  due  to  poverty. 

Nothing  is  so  depressing  as  to  visit  a  home 
for  the  aged  or  to  pass  by  an  orphan  asylum. 
A  gentleman  walking  along  a  driveway  in 
the  outskirts  of  a  large  city  met  six  little 

124 


WELFARE  INSURANCE 

children,  from  five  to  ten  years  of  age,  and 
in  buying  the  flowers  they  had  been  gather- 
ing, engaged  them  in  conversation.  He 
asked  them  if  they  were  all  members  of  one 
family.  A  sad  expression  clouded  the  face 
of  the  eldest  child,  a  little  girl,  and  she 
said,  "  No,  we  are  from  the  Home  up  here," 
—pointing  to  a  large  house  nearby — an 
orphan  home.  This  is  something  which 
should  get  under  the  vests  of  the  officers, 
directors  and  superintendents  of  the  business 
institutions  of  the  country.  She,  poor  little 
child,  did  not  know  that  they  did  belong  to 
one  family,  the  great  human  family.  Yes: 
and  to  another  family,  a  family — all  too 
large — those  children  brought  into  the  world 
whose  heritage  is  crime,  sickness,  incompe- 
tency,  degeneracy — directly  traceable  to 
poverty — and — if  you  please — unnecessary 
poverty ! 

The  relation  of  this   incident  does  not 

emanate  alone  from  criticism  or  pessimism; 

it  is  to  visualize  a  condition  close  to  the  hearts 

of  men  and  women  in  these  United  States. 

125 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

The  "  mental  slant  "  of  the  men  upon  the 
hilltop  has  changed.  Business  men  have 
taken  an  account  of  stock  and  recognize  the 
necessity  of  knowing — and  considering — the 
"  mental  slant "  of  all  those  who  work  for  a 
wage. 

It  is  all  the  more  to  their  credit  that  there 
is  a  moral  fibre  growing  into  the  business 
fabric  of  this  country,  wholesome  in  the  ex- 
treme. There  is  a  preponderance  of  men 
engaged  in  business  to-day  who  are  real 
heroes  in  the  world's  work.  They  are  the 
men  who  carry  religion  and  the  exercise  of 
the  Golden  Rule  into  their  dealings  with 
their  fellow-men.  Not  the  kind  of  religion 
that  warps  the  soul,  prays  on  Sunday,  lies  on 
Monday,  and  grinds  down  one's  fellow-men 
the  rest  of  the  week,  but  real  religion  deep 
down  in  the  soul,  that  makes  the  heart  beat 
for  humanity,  and  recognizes  and  carries  out 
the  brotherhood  of  man. 

There  is  no  system  of  finance  ever  devised 
which  approaches  the  usefulness  of  the  sys- 
tem of  sound  Life  Insurance  to  prevent  pov- 

126 


WELFARE  INSURANCE 

erty — Life  Insurance  in  its  general  applica- 
tion, and  in  its  specific  use  by  business  con- 
cerns as  a  welfare  measure. 

One  of  the  great  values  of  Welfare  Insur- 
ance is  the  effect  upon  the  "  mind  slant  "  of 
the  employee  and  his  family.  It  should  be 
borne  in  mind,  in  the  practice  of  Welfare 
Insurance,  whether  the  form  of  procedure  be 
in  individual  policies  or  "  en-group,"  that  the 
"  mind  slant  "  of  the  wage  earner  himself  is 
important,  and  his  attitude  of  mind  enhanced 
by  that  form  of  contract  which  benefits  him 
during  his  own  life. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

INCOME  INSURANCE 

IN  the  early  practice  of  life  insurance,  it 
was  found  that  moneys  left  from  Life  Insur- 
ance Policies  were  subjected  to  the  same  dis- 
sipation as  occurs  in  Estates  left  to  depend- 
ents from  other  sources.  To  avoid  this  evil 
and  secure  to  the  beneficiaries  under  policies 
the  means  of  livelihood  after  death  of  the 
breadwinner,  Income  Insurance  was  origi- 
nated. The  name  "  Income  "  implies  the  na- 
ture of  such  policies  or  manner  of  payment 
of  regular  contracts.  Through  the  ingenuity 
of  Companies'  able  Actuaries,  a  great  prob- 
lem has  been  solved. 

Under  the  present  modern  practice  of  the 
Life  Insurance  Companies  it  is  possible  to 
assure  an  income  to  any  beneficiary  or  mul- 
tiplicity of  beneficiaries  by  eliminating  en- 
tirely the  hazard  of  forfeiture  to  or  dissi- 
pation by  the  recipient  or  recipients  of  the 
proceeds  of  a  policy  or  policies. 

128 


INCOME  INSURANCE 

Through  income  options  in  modern  Life 
Insurance  contracts  the  insured  can  build  a 
monument  in  the  mind  of  a  dependent  or 
loved  one  in  the  shape  of  a  payment  on  a 
certain  day  of  every  year,  or  even  month,  as 
long  as  the  beneficiary  survives. 

The  entire  proceeds  of  a  policy  can  be  left 
with  a  company  at  interest  under  a  specified 
arrangement  offering  conditions  more  ad- 
vantageous than  afforded  by  the  ordinary 
Trust. 

This  subject,  like  Business  Life  Insurance 
or  Welfare  Insurance,  is  one  that  should  be 
treated  in  a  book  by  itself.  It  is  sufficient 
here  to  point  out  that  the  manner  of  paying 
such  policies  is  almost  limitless  and  offers  a 
medium  of  thorough  and  secure  protection 
for  either  a  specified  term  of  years  or  the  life 
of  an  individual  which  is  not  equalled  by  any 
other  system  of  finance. 


9 


CHAPTER  XV 

LAYMEN'S  RESPONSIBILITY 

THE  public  are  vitally  interested  in  the 
laws  enacted  in  the  several  States  as  affect- 
ing sound  Life  Insurance.  They  have  a  re- 
sponsibility and  interdependent  relation  to 
the  subject  of  legislation,  and  this  responsi- 
bility is  a  duty  which  every  citizen  owes  the 
State,  himself  and  the  business,  and  to  shirk 
this  duty  or  to  exercise  it  in  an  antagonistic 
manner  is  the  grossest  kind  of  short-sight- 
edness. 

Life  Insurance  is  a  quasi-public  institu- 
tion, and  only  such  legislation  which  is 
founded  upon  the  most  extended  practice 
of  community  of  interest  should  be  in  the 
mind  of  any  right-thinking  citizen. 

In  the  matter  alone  of  taxation,  the  policy- 
holders  pay  millions  of  dollars  each  year 
above  the  cost  of  administration,  and  any  tax- 
ation above  the  cost  of  administration  has 

130 


LAYMEN'S  RESPONSIBILITY 

no  foundation  in  reason,  and  is  a  direct  bur- 
den upon  thrift  and  protection  of  the  home. 
The  enactment  of  laws,  whether  taxation  or 
otherwise,  which  are  burdensome  and  ex- 
pensive to  the  Companies,  are,  in  fact,  more 
important  to  the  people  themselves  than  the 
Companies  as  corporate  entities. 

In  Chapter  XII  reference  was  made 
to  the  standardized  representative  in  Life 
Insurance.  There  is  upon  the  part  of  Life 
Insurance  interests  a  genuine  attempt  to  pro- 
fessionalize and  standardize  service  to  policy- 
holders,  and  the  results  to  policyholders  in 
better  arrangement  give  ample  proof  of 
greatly  improved  conditions  and  that  prog- 
ress is  constantly  going  on.  This  progress, 
however,  would  proceed  with  far  greater 
rapidity  if  the  people  themselves  took  a 
greater  interest  in  Life  Insurance  and  act- 
ually learned  and  carried  out  their  responsi- 
bility and  interdependent  relation  in  the 
premises. 

Life  Insurance,  as  has  been  shown  in  the 
statements  made  throughout  this  book,  espe- 

131 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

cially  in  reference  to  its  more  modern  prac- 
tices, is  not  a  thing  apart  from  other  ordi- 
nary affairs  of  life — it  is  very  ordinary,  very 
practical,  but  very  important.  Any  attitude 
of  aloofness,  antagonism  or  disinterested- 
ness on  the  part  of  laymen  is  the  most 
short-sighted  policy,  because  the  business  has 
now  proven  in  itself  great  worth  in  the 
United  States  and  has  become  a  part — a 
very  great  part — of  the  moral  and  business 
fibre  of  the  country. 

Disinterestedness,  cumbersome  legislation 
and  indefensible  taxation  add  to  the  cost  of 
administration  and  marketing  this  very  im- 
portant product.  Increased  outlay  in  both 
cases  adds  to  the  cost  of  insurance  to  the  indi- 
vidual policyholder.  Then  the  public,  by 
exercising  the  same  fine  discrimination  in 
the  purchase  of  Life  Insurance  which  they 
employ  in  buying  any  other  important  com- 
modity, will  aid  the  insurance  interests  in 
eliminating  the  weaker  representatives  who 
also  add  to  the  cost  of  insurance  and  lower 
its  professional  dignity  as  well. 

132 


LAYMEN'S  RESPONSIBILITY 

The  people  have  seen  to  it,  through  legisla- 
tion, that  they  had  reasonable  protection  in 
regard  to  those  practitioners  who  were  ad- 
mitted to  the  practice  of  law  or  medicine  or 
who  were  allowed  to  do  other  things  of  less 
importance.  They  are  equally  interested  and 
should  exercise  similar  precautionary  meas- 
ures in  securing  the  passage  of  such  laws  as 
would  make  it  impossible  for  any  one  to  sell 
or  attempt  to  sell  them  Life  Insurance 
whose  license  to  do  this  very  important  thing 
was  not  predicated  upon  educational  fitness 
through  standards  laid  down  by  the  States 
themselves. 

A  lack  of  understanding  and  co-operation 
or  recognition  of  the  true  nature  of  the  prin- 
ciples and  practice  of  interdependence  as 
between  employer  and  employee  or  between 
the  people,  the  State  and  any  world  move- 
ment, or,  in  very  fact,  between  nations  and 
peoples  themselves,  is  responsible  for  a  vast 
majority  of  all  the  troubles  and  evils  of  man- 
kind. 

With  this  fact  in  mind  and  considering  the 

133 


LIFE  INSURANCE 

ramifying  importance  of  sound  Life  Insur- 
ance, there  can  be  no  reason  other  than  short- 
sighted supineness  for  the  people  in  the 
United  States  not  exercising  a  far  greater 
spirit  of  interest  and  co-operation  in  so  re- 
markable an  institution,  interwoven  as  it  is  in 
both  their  home  and  business  life. 

Finally,  every  policyholder  should  ever 
keep  in  mind  that  the  one  best  option  in  a 
life  insurance  contract  to  exercise  is  carry- 
ing the  policy  through  to  the  end  and  without 
ever  passing  a  premium  or  borrowing  money 
on  the  policy.  That  the  chief  function  and 
all-important  one  to  the  insured  is  the  select- 
ing of  his  agent  by  the  same  standards  em- 
ployed in  choosing  a  lawyer  or  a  doctor. 


YB   17866' 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE  LAST  DATE 
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JIM       f    1OCA  t  ti 


